Blood Bond: Love in Gentle Mind
by Personification of Fluff
Summary: After seeing a murder in the woods, Manny’s whole world is flipped upside down and suddenly the murderer wants to gain her silence by forcing her to drink his blood. Result of NaNoWriMo2008.
1. Chapter 1

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**Blood Bond: Love in Gentle Mind**

**Author: **The Personification of Fluff

**Rating: **M, for cusses, torture/interrogation, and cute boys.

**Genre: **drama/romance

**Disclaimer: **The Night World, and its affiliates like Ash and Poppy, belong to LJ Smith. Nipissing University is a real place, and my alma mater, and I own none of it… except for one tile which, according to tradition, is now the property of the graduating class which signed it. I hold that's mine. Manny's physical description is based on a real person with whom I went to school, and her name was taken from one of my clients at work because I thought Manouchka was the prettiest, most exotic sounding name I'd ever heard. Lacey is also a real person, and may even be a witch. If so, she as a bazillion familiars. Heather McGugan is also a real person, albeit neither Scottish nor a professor at Nipissing (yet, we hope! Go you!) I am not making money off of this, thought is for advertising, I presume, and I maintain that since I'm not making money off of this, rabid fan girls everywhere may abuse Joshua within appropriate limits (i.e. Goats should not become involved.)

**AN:** So, after my NaNoWriMo went up a few years back (_Divided we Stand_) someone suggested I should do more Night World fanfics. God help them.

I sat around for a year or two, until NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month, in which you have all of November to write a 50,000 word story) rolled around in 2008. By then I had some characters in mind and a loosely constructed "plot", both of which I hear are essential to a story. After many cups of coffee and several weeks, I had fifty-one thousand words, the novel was mostly done, and I had plenty of November left. Eventually it was finished, and the editing began, and now it's ready to go up. Hopefully it will be uploaded a chapter a week, though the day it gets uploaded will change based upon my work schedule.

Unlike _Divided We Stand_, which was my attempt at social commentary, this was my attempt at writing a bad-ass good guy/bad guy (you know, like Damon Salvatore, who seems to switch roles depending upon what he can get out of the situation). I thought it would be fun to write… and you know what? It isn't. Joshua's character was the hardest to nail down ever and I have much more admiration to the people who can write characters like that—namely in the romance genre, and I think that they write those roles so many times (since each new male love interest is a carbon copy of the last one) that they have perfected their crafts to a science. But I leave Joshua up to you to tell me your thoughts. He seems pretty stagnant in the story because only Manny's POV of him changes (and through her, hopefully, your own)—therefore he never really changes in the story because he was always that way to begin with, Manny simply didn't notice it.

Constructive criticisms on his character welcomed.

**Summary:** After seeing a murder in the woods, Manny's whole world is flipped upside down: her best friend is a witch and, oh yeah, the guy she saw kill him wants to gain her silence by forcing her to drink his blood. What else do you need when you have a major paper due in a week? How about the crush of your life finally taking interest!

**Chapter One**

The hardest thing, Manny decided that night, was to wait for something that you knew was going to happen, to actually happen.

She squirmed in her seat as she sat in English class. Professor McGugan had started it by telling them that their first essay had been marked and would be handed out at _the end_ of class. Most people, she had announced, had done moderately well, but some of them were utterly deplorable.

Manny knew which end she was on. The question was how low on the bad scale was she? Was it just a C+ or B-, or had she failed? The worry that she had failed her first English paper of the year made her hands damp and clammy.

Nipissing University students hated the English faculty. The first year course was specifically designed to weed out people who weren't perfectly serious about English studies. The second year mandatory course, Medieval British Literature, was just as painful and weeded out just as many students. Manny had seen at least ten people drop the course because it was so difficult reading the texts in their original language, rather than a translation of it.

"Matt's back from break," Lacey pointed out, poking Manny's shoulder. She grinned and peered down the lecture hall at the boy in question.

Matt Aspen was the number one reason that Manny refused to drop Brit Lit, the second being that she was resolute in achieving her career goal. She wanted to be a librarian at a prestigious university and work with old, foreign texts. She needed this credit. She also wanted to be working at that university library married to Matt Aspen; beautiful, volleyball-playing, Student Council-leading Matt Aspen. Even his name sounded beautiful to her.

He looked up, as if sensing eyes on him. At the back of the lecture hall Manny could still tell that they were green—bright and beautiful green, like the center of the lightest jade. Combined with his soft brown hair that fell across his forehead, decisive eyebrows that always gave him an expression of concentration, and the bump in his Roman nose that gave evidence of having been broken at least once, he was…. Gorgeous.

Lacey called him sex on a stick.

Manny didn't understand exactly what the term meant, but she agreed with Lacey in its sentiment. Matt Aspen was a walking God on their campus.

But Matt didn't notice Manny. He waved to a girl in front of Manny and she waved back, giggling. It was the typical well-endowed, long-haired blonde. It was the type of woman that the Student Council president would want on his arm walking the university hallways.

Manny did not look like the typical girl with whom a president should be seen. She was painfully ordinary. She was of average height for a girl, with above-average hips. Manny hated her hips and legs. If they were as curvy and thin as her torso, she knew she'd have her pick of men, but instead they called her fat and walked away.

Lacey patted her shoulder gently. "I'm sorry, Manny."

"Don't worry," Manny said, forcing a smile and waving away Lacey's concern. "I know that he doesn't know who I am. I'm not delusional, Lacey. I'm Captain Average. Someone like Matt needs someone… special."

"You are special, Manny!"

Her brown eyes softened as she turned to look at her roommate. Her heart-shaped face was almost angelic, and the smile she wore softened the stubborn cut of her chin. "No, I'm really not, Lace. Not special _enough_, anyway. Not for him."

Lacey snorted. "Then he's delusional and selfish."

She sighed with love. "No… Matt could never be selfish. He's sweet and gentle and romantic. A helpless romantic…"

Distracted as she was by Matt, she didn't pay attention to the rest of the class. Before she knew it, Professor McGugan was beginning to hand back the term papers. Lacey Embers was one of the first called. She walked down to the front of the lecture hall, poised and graceful against the snickers at her name.

People teased Lacey about her name, but they never teased her to her face. If they persisted in making fun of her name and the mental picture it created, they learned to do it in whispers very quickly. When she turned her face on them with uncanning accuracy, her violet eyes narrowing and her vibrant red hair hanging around her lips, they paled and quickly looked away.

She came back and sat in the seat with a triumphant flounce, her face flushed with happiness. Manny groaned and felt a little sick with worry. Lacey'd gotten another 'A'.

"Manouchka LaRue."

She walked down and picked up her paper in a fog. By the time she'd climbed back up to the top of Weaver Hall, she still hadn't opened it. Lacey had to pry the paper from her damp hands and press out the crinkles so she could turn the pages. Manny swallowed, finding her mouth painfully dry.

"Oh… Manny, it's not… it's not _all_ bad."

"Just… is it a pass or a fail?"

Lacey's voice was pained. "It's a fail." Manny's head hit the desk in front of her with a painful thump and her roommate had to force enthusiasm into her voice. "But she's willing to give you a rewrite! All you have to do is go and talk to her. Go on, Manny! Talk to her!"

Manny checked her wristwatch. "Yeah… I'm going to have to. I don't want to have to take this course again. It wouldn't be as much fun without you. You go on ahead and catch the bus home. I'll be home soon."

Lacey frowned, touching Manny's dark hair gently. "Are you sure you don't want me to stick around and wait for you, Manny? I don't mind, you know."

"I know. No, you go ahead. Besides, _So You Think You Can Dance_ will be starting soon, and we need someone to steal the television from Beth and Tanya so we can tape it. If you're not home to grab that television at ten, we're going to miss it."

"Okay. Good luck, Manny."

Lacey stuck around a few moments longer to pack her belongings and toss Manouchka a thumbs-up before she began heading off. By herself, Manny suddenly didn't feel brave enough to approach the professor, as much as she needed the credit. She quietly threw on her winter jacket and dragged her heavy backpack to her shoulder, intent on sneaking out.

"Are you certain you don't want to talk about your paper, Miss LaRue?" Professor McGugan's dry voice, thick with her Scottish accent, cut through the empty classroom, freezing Manny where she stood. "Yours could certainly use some improvement."

Knowing she was caught, Manny lowered her head and walked to the front of the Weaver lecture hall where Heather McGugan leaned against the lecture podium. Looking at her, there was nothing that made her look intimidating. Somewhere in her forties, she had thick black hair that was visibly greying and she made no sign to hide it, wearing her hair up in a professional bun at all times. She wore glasses, even when she lectured, leaving them hanging from the bejewelled cord around her neck so she couldn't misplace them. Up close, her eyes were closer to grey than blue, and fixed people with a certain penetrating stare.

Manny thought that if someone ever tried to lie in front of her about a term paper, those eyes would rip the lie from them and leave them a slobbering mess. She ducked her head lower, staring at the professor's feet, to keep from looking at those eyes.

"Do you know what the problem was with your paper, Miss LaRue?"

Her voice was surprisingly gentle, and Manny risked looking up at her. Rather than looking stern, she appeared… disappointed. Shock hit her gently and she felt a bubble of hope rising. "No."

"The problem was that I asked for you to write me an essay."

"I did."

"No, you wrote me a research paper," she admonished. "The difference between them is subtle, but an essay has an original thought behind it. A research paper just tells me what other people have thought on the subject. That's what your paper did. You never made your own claim in it."

Manny was surprised. A teacher wanted to hear her own ideas on a subject? But the teacher was continuing, picking up her lecture notes and stuffing them neatly into her briefcase. "I'll give you a week to rewrite your paper and put your own ideas into it, but don't make this mistake again. I want to hear the voice of Manny LaRue when I read your paper, and hear your original ideas. I don't want a report on what dead English researchers have thought in the past. Understand?"

'No,' Manny thought, dazed. 'I don't understand. You're giving me a rewrite? Really? Seriously?' Yet she found herself nodding, her smile so wide she thought it might make her cheeks hurt if it didn't let up soon. "Yes, Professor."

Her smile was still on her face as she left the University to head back to residence. The crowd outside waiting for the bus was huge—that was always the problem with night classes. When over a thousand students from the various faculties all were let out of class at the same time and the bus only came once every half hour, sometimes one could wait three buses before actually getting a ride.

Rather than waiting, she hiked her knapsack further up her shoulders and set off in a brisk walk. Nights in October in northern Ontario came quickly. At a quarter to ten it was almost pitch black, and it was still two days before Halloween. Her breath rolled out in waves as she walked, making her laugh. Winter was approaching, and she could feel it in the world around her—from the way the autumn leaves crunched underfoot, to the way the tip of her nose was already numb with cold, and from the sharpness in the air.

Across the street from the university, the path to the residences at the bottom of the hill went through the woods. The path was a meandering one, but paved, with emergency lights and phones interspersed around it. The path was also empty. Manny shivered with a wave of paranoia. She had never realized that without Lacey walking home with her, the path was… _creepy_.

Wind shook and rattled the naked limbs of trees, sounding like bones. It kicked up clouds of dead leaves and rustled them. Dark shapes skittered along the ground in the underbrush—more than likely squirrels, but possibly raccoons or skunks. Many clutched her backpack tighter and began moving faster.

A bigger shape suddenly flew out of one side of the path and into the other. Manny shrieked, and then jumped back as another large shape followed the first one. Far too big for a bird it was… a person. They disappeared into the trees, moving almost too fast for the eye to see. Now that she knew they were there, she could hear them fighting. Wondering what was going on, Manny veered off the trail to follow them.

The two shapes were a blur in the forest, but they were clearly fighting. One shape was shorter than the other, and it was the one that was winning. She watched through the cedar bushes and trees as they came body to body and the smaller shape flung off the other one into a tree with a loud crack. Manny covered her gasp with her hands, thinking the other person dead. He hit the tree with such a loud crack that surely even lower residence had heard it! But he stood up, shaking his head to clear it, and lunged at the other shape.

As they fought, constantly moving, the light from the streetlamps came close enough to illuminate their faces for a moment. Her heart stopped beating when she saw them. They were… beautiful. They were the best looking men that she'd ever seen. The larger one had a face like a Roman, with high, sculpted cheekbones and dark hair that lay flat against his head with sweat. The other one looked like a Gaul, she thought, or maybe a Frank, with close-cropped brown hair so fair it turned blonde in the light.

She wondered what they would be fighting over as the larger one punched the short one in the face so hard she _heard _his nose break. Blood ran down his lips and chin from the blow, but he acted like nothing had happened, punching the man back in the sternum and making him double over. While his opponent was weakened he slammed his open hand down across the man's neck. Manny gasped and realized that she was seeing something serious. A move like that would break a man's neck! It could shatter the backbone and cripple him!

But the other man just went to his knees from the force of the blow. He was still alive and breathing, his arms still working. The dark-haired man glared up at the other one. "You'll never be able to keep her, old man."

Ah, Manny thought, so this was about love.

The light-haired man clenched his hand and reached down to his belt. Manny had watched enough television to recognize a knife being drawn even when she could neither see it nor hear it. "We'll last long enough without a pup like you to tattle on us."

Without another word, he slammed the knife he held into the man's chest, right into his heart. The man went stiff with pain and the force of the strike drove him to his back. His legs made a few futile kicks, and then he was still.

Manny screamed.

It was a stupid thing to do, she'd realize later. If she hadn't screamed, she could have made it back to lower residence and called the police without a problem. Screaming had just seemed like the natural thing to do. She had just seen a man stab another man in the chest with a knife. She should scream. His legs kicked futilely in death. She should scream. She could smell it when his bowels released. She should scream.

A man was laying across from her, dead, and she had just seen a man kill him.

She should scream.

The man's head whipped up and his eyes focused on her inert form as she stood locked with fear, still screaming. She'd scream until her breath ran out. He quickly drew the dagger from the man's chest, and when the scent of blood reached her, it spurred Manny into running. She turned and fled, hearing the man's footsteps after her.

The rest of the way to lower residence was all downhill—easy running. She dumped her knapsack on the ground and heard a satisfied trip. She risked a glance over her shoulder to see that the man had actually stumbled over it. How? How had he gotten close enough so soon to be able to trip over it?

Just how fast was he?

She had her answer a half second later when he stood up and came after her with inhuman speed. In the time it took her to curse he'd taken up half the distance between them. Her whole body jerked when she tripped into the underbrush. She'd missed one of the turns in the path and was in the forest now. Her momentum carried her forward and she fell, headfirst, down the rest of the path to home.

Branches dug into her limbs and she curled herself instinctively to protect her head. They ripped at her clothes and hair. She was done for if she struck a tree going at her speed. If that didn't kill her, then the man behind surely would take advantage of a concussion! He'd already killed a man in cold blood!

She cried out as they bruised her body and gagged when dry leaves and dirt filled her mouth as she rolled and fell down the steep hill, but she slowly came to a stop. Manny willed her body into getting up, rolling over on all fours and ignoring the pain. She wasn't certain where she was, but she could see the tall seven-floor building of Chancellor's Hall in front of her. All she had to do was head toward the lights.

She was limping for home when she heard a soft thud behind her. Manny turned and looked over her shoulder to see the man in a crouch. He'd followed her, straight down the hill, except that apparently he'd kept his balance rather than falling the whole way. His head shot up and his eyes locked on her. She swore she could see his nose twitch, as if he were picking up her scent. Manny broke into a run as best she could on her legs, clutching at her side and hoping that her ribs weren't broken from her perilous fall.

The door was close. Her head felt foggy. She began to slow and stumble, giving into the urge to sleep away the pain and dizziness. Manny pushed such thoughts away. She could sleep after she was safe.

Manny reached the door and tried to wrench it open, but the door was locked. She cursed loudly, reaching for her keys in her pocket with shaking hands. They were shaking so bad that she couldn't manage to get the key into the lock on her first try. When she did, she had to struggle to remember which way to turn it. Clearly, Nipissing had not designed the doors with consideration for young ladies horrified beyond their imagination trying to find sanctuary.

She looked over her shoulder, she saw that the man was almost upon her. His lips were tight in anger and she could make out the color of his eyes now. They were violet, but not the deep amethyst of Lacey's eyes—his were a murky, blue-tinged purple, the color of the deep ocean or galactic dust clouds. He lunged for her, and she suddenly fell through the door. Sharp pains stabbed her knees as she tumbled to the linoleum floor. The shadow of the man fell around her. Manny called out for help, and for the police. She saw the shadow still for a moment, panicked. She scrambled to her feet, limping heavily, and past the stairs into the main room, and to the front desk, still screaming for police.

Glancing through the door back into the stairwell and the back door, the man was glaring at her. His eyes searched her face, studying it… memorizing it. Then, he slowly lifted his arm and pointed at her, then drew his finger across his throat before he walked back out the back door. The meaning was universal, and Manouchka felt weak in the knees from it.

He was going to kill her.

-To Be Continued


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: **For some reason deleted all my quotation marks and apostraphes, so I had to put them all back in. I really hope it won't happen with chapter three.

**Chapter Two**

Nipissing University dorm rooms were designed to give the illusion of openness. The result of having an open kitchen and television room was that the hallways were cramped and dark. The front door opened into a long hallway, and rooms spurted out of it like skinny twigs from a branch. There was the first bathroom, Beth and Tanya's bedrooms, the kitchen, and then Lacey and Manouchka's bedrooms and their bathroom.

Sitting in the kitchen with a cup of hot chocolate in her hands and the dark hallways staring at her, with their cement bricks and pale painting job, Manny wasn't entirely certain that the Nipissing dorm room was a warmer place than being interrogated by the police at the station.

"You saw him stab him in the heart?" the female police officer asked. Many nodded numbly. "Then what happened?"

"He kicked and fought for a second or two, and then he stopped moving completely. I was screaming and the other man began chasing me."

The two police officers (Manny wondered why they always came in twos) exchanged expressions, and she feared then that they didn't believe her.

Lacey had been keeping her sane while the police had arrived and proceeded to question her. It was Manny's second time telling the policew officers her story. She probably would have broken down reliving the events again, and the encuing fear that had made it hard to breathe as she ran for her life, but her tears had been used up already. Now she had only the hiccups and a feeling of being tired, though the hot chocolate had helped to keep her warm and awake.

"Did you recognize either of these men?" the female cop queried. Manny shook her head no and the officer glanced back down at her notes. "And the one chasing you, you say that he was blonde, with purple eyes?" The officer's gaze flickered back up to Lacey hovering protectively by Manouchka's side, who had purple eyes. "I'd think I'd recognize someone who had eyes that color..."

"I would. I have never seen him before," Manny growled out through gritted teeth, becoming annoyed.

She was tired and dirty and grumpy. Bruises were already breaking out along her sides from her fall down the cliff. Leaves and twigs were still caught in her hair, though Lacey had tried to make her look more presentable. Her knees, elbows, legs and arms were scratched and bleeding. Her pants were ruined, and her jacket would have to be patched up before it would be wearable again.

"Uh-huh." The male officer, finally breaking his silence, brushed brown hair from his face. "Did he have any type of gang symbols or colors on him that you would recognize?"

Manny's dark eyes flickered dangerously, changing from gold-brown to chocolate brown. Lacey reached over and gripped her shoulder tightly. "I'm afraid I wouldnt know what to look for in terms of gang symbols or colors," she growled.

The man looked surprised. "But I thought..."

"I can assure you," Manny growled out, "that every black person does not have an innate, underlying, racial nor inherited, subconscious knowledge of gang symbols or colors. He wasn't wearing an arm band like the Hitler youths, or bandannas like a bicycle gang from television, and for all I know, the fact that his jeans were about ten years out of style meant that he belongs to a gang. So, no, I don't remember anything! I just remember seeing a man getting stabbed, and then I ran home in fear for my life and he followed me all the way into the residence and made a very clear threat to kill me!"

"How quickly did you say this man ran?"

That was the female cop again, Lieutenant Dawson. Manny had figured out their tactic now. In the guise of being thorough, the female was repeating questions, looking for errors in Manny's story. The male was asking questions to further the story. Neither of them was playing the bad cop, but the repetition was annoying. Maybe if there was more to her story she might remember something else, something helpful, something to put a new angle on it, but for the most part her story was: a man was stabbed, I saw it and screamed, ran home, and was threatened by him.

"Fast. He was fast."

"_How_ fast?

"I don't know! I don't exactly have a speedometer built into my watch! He was faster than me, certainly. I don't think I would have gotten away if I hadnt dropped my knapsack and then fell down that hill." She suddenly laughed. "I never thought that being a klutz would save me, but apparently it did."

"Would you be willing to go with us up the hill and show us the scene of the crime?"

That was the male cop, Officer Forrest. Manny hated him. The color drained from her face, leaving her looking sickly. Go back out, into the woods, to the crime scene?

No.

No!

"Okay. I... I think I can do that. I mean, you guys have guns, right? So if he's still out there, you should be able to protect me."

It was meant as a joke, but to her horror, the male cop nodded. "We'll do our best, Miss LaRue."

His idea of a guarantee wasnt very comforting. Manny hoped that he just suffered from a lack of humor and that he wasn't being serious.

* * *

Manny led them back up the hill. Lacey had refused to remain at home and supported Manouchka's weight as she limped along. They had found the wreckage left from Manny's tumble, but had taken the path up, leaving Dawson to climb up through the forest and take initial pictures.

"Hey! My knapsack!"

Lacey bent down to pick it up, but the male cop stopped her. "Leave it there. Dawson will come across it and will take pictures of it. Then we'll take it back to residence and make sure nothing's missing from it."

"Are you going to be okay?" Lacey whispered to her friend, concerned. She had noticed that Manny was shivering. "You dont have to do this."

"Yes, I do," she whispered back, sticking her chin out stubbornly. "I saw someone murdered. I have to do this. It's like it's my... my _duty_."

She lifted a hand to stroke Manouchka's hair, planting a kiss on the taller girl's cheek--about as high as she could reach on Manny. "You're a brave kid, Manny, and whatever happens, I believe you and what you saw tonight."

Reassured as she was by Lacey's vow, Manny had to wonder exactly what she meant. Why wouldn't the police believe her? They'd already found the damage left behind from her fall down university hill, as well as her knapsack abandoned in the path where she'd dumped it in order to make herself faster. She pointed them to where she remembered standing watching the two men fight.

"You're certain that this is the point?" Dawson called out from between the trees.

Manny pointed down at the ground beside where she and Lacey stood. Even in the darkness, she could see her own footprints in the long grass where she'd stepped into the forest to see the fight. "Yes."

Officer Forrest shrugged. "I don't see any sign of a fight."

"What?" She pushed herself away from Lacey to limp into the forest, but Dawson was already agreeing with her partner.

"It's impossible!"

The clearing that they were standing in, small and cramped as it was, was undisturbed. There was no body on the ground. There wasn't any sign of blood on the leaves as the police moved their flashlights along the ground. They hadn't even been moved. A thick layer of leaves covered the ground, as flat and natural as the rest of the forest floor.

Manny angrily pointed at the tree against which the body had slumped. "It was right there! He was laying right there!"

"Well, if he had been right there, there's nothing to prove that he was." Dawson straightened from where she crouched and turned off her flashlight. "Come along, ladies. Let's go back to residence and look through the knapsack, and make sure that nothing's missing. We'll have someone come up and process the scene, but there's nothing else we can really do tonight."

The policemen were kind enough to escort them back to Chancellor's house and up to their room on the third floor. Once there, they emptied out the knapsack, allowing Manny to sort through it and make sure that everything was there. Her textbooks and notebook, as well as the failed English paper, were all present. So was her wallet, but when she opened it...

"My student card's missing."

"We can get you another one tomorrow morning from student services. If you don't have bus money, I have change you can have."

"No! Dont you see, Lace? He took it! He took it from my wallet! Now he knows what I look like _and_ he knows my name!" Fear made her heart thrum quickly. She felt exposed. The urge she'd had to curl up in bed under the blankets and hide had been stripped away by this new development.

Her bed wasnt safe anymore. Her apartment wasnt safe anymore. Even her classrooms might not be safe, if he could use her student card number to track down her school schedule.

Everything passed in a blur after that. Manny withdrew into herself, refusing to answer anymore question. Lacey began taking charge of the situation, and when they asked her if she'd been drinking, Manny snapped. She threw herself out of her chair, yelling at them: "Yes! Yes, I've been drinking! I must have imagined the whole thing! Thats why I left my belongings out there, that's why I lost my own student card! That's why I threw myself down a hill and why I'm so scared I can't sit without shivering! I imagined everything! I never saw him die! I was never chased! I made it _all_ up because I was _drinking_!"

They looked like they almost believed her outburst. Dawson's mouth turned up in a slight smile before she controlled it. Manny was hurt--the expression on the lieutenant's face was an emotional blow with which she could not deal. They _wanted_ her to be lying.

That was sick and wrong!

Lacey jumped in before matters could become worse. "Manouchka's tired right now. Why don't we continue this discussion tomorrow, sometime? It's after midnight now, and some of us do have classes tomorrow morning."

Forrest shrugged, flipping his notebook closed. "That sounds like a plan, Miss Embers. Truth is, Miss LaRue, you're probably the victim of an elaborate Halloween prank. This isn't the first time we've seen something like this happen. Remember the Canadore College kids who broke into the house next door through the basement? He shook his head. I wouldnt be worried, Miss LaRue."

He smiled charmingly as he put on his cap and handed his partner her jacket. "This will all seem foolish in the morning when the suns up."

"Thank you, officers. I'll see you downstairs."

"No need, Miss LaRue. We've been here enough times to know the way out. Have a nice night, ladies."

Lacey turned back to Manny and helped her out of the kitchen chair. "Come along, then. You go and have a shower, get all of that gook out of your hair and bind your wounds and I'll make you some tea. You'll sleep like a baby tonight."

She wanted to argue that she didn't want to sleep, but the argument never came. Lacey made wonderful teas from the dried herb collection she had. Even the worse case of Manny's insomnia had been cured by them. If the man was real and did come for her in the night, then at least she'd go quickly in her sleep. There would be no long, drawn out waiting she'd close her eyes, and they would never open again.

Except that she didnt really want to die.

"Thanks, Lace," she said.

"No problem."

The shower made her feel much more refreshed. Manny felt so numb that when she washed her cuts she barely noticed the sting of the soap. Lacey had brought her the fluffiest pajamas she could find: a pair of purple flannel pajamas with a plaid pattern. When she slipped into them, Manouchka could almost believe that everything she had seen was a bad dream.

Armed with Lacey's cup of tea, she sat on her bed, and suddenly the cup fell from her fingers.

Her missing student card was sitting on her pillow.

She knew she hadn't left it there in the morning. She would have needed it to take the bus. Either way, she certainly never would have left it laying on her own pillow, like a mint sitting on a pillow in some fancy hotel.

He'd been in her bedroom.

He'd been there while she was next door, showering, and Lacey was two doors down making tea.

He was mocking her.

Manny picked up the student card and held it in her hand. It felt foreign. She scanned the room quickly, ignoring the growing stain on the carpet from the tea, to search for anything else he might have moved or taken. She froze when her gaze fell on the window.

He was there, watching her.

But that was impossible! She was on the third floor!

Manny blinked, and the window was empty. She was certain hed just been there, though! His eyes had actually met with hers, and rather than purple, they'd been blue--deep sapphire blue. They had stared at each other before she had blinked.

She turned and rushed out the door, past Lacey in the kitchen, past Beth and Tanya as they dragged themselves home from the bar. She could hear Lacey chasing after her as she stormed the stairs, taking them two at a time. She burst from the back door and Chancellor's house.

The ground under her window was undisturbed, just like the forest. There were no footprints in the ground beneath her bedroom window, and no sign that anything like a ladder had been leaned up against it. If he had been at the window, and she was still certain he had been, then he must have jumped up somehow.

"Manny! Whats wrong?"

Lacey stood in the doorway of the building, holding the door open so that it wouldn't lock them both out.

"I... I saw him! He was outside my window."

"Manny, that's impossible."

"That's what I said. I just I just had to come back outside and check that that he wasn't really here."

Lacey clucked her tongue and shook her head as she held open the door for Manny. She wrapped her arms loosely around the taller girl. "Poor Manny. He really did give you quite a scare, didnt he?" Manny could only numbly shake her head. Seeing his face outside her window was the last scare shed needed. "Did you drink your tea yet?"

"No, I dropped it on the floor."

"Well, I'll make you another cup, and while it's steeping we'll clean up your floor for you. I promise that it'll help."

Manny snuggled closer to her best friend as they ascended the stairs. "Thanks, Lace. And about what you said earlier, about believing me? Thank you for that, too."

She hadn't known what that would mean at the time when Lacey had initially said it. It had seemed to Manny like an automatic response, a kind of condolence. She hadn't expected she'd be seeing faces lurking in third-floor window, or that the ground would be undisturbed when she had seen them fighting, or that all traces of blood would have magically disappeared, but they had... And yet, Lacey believed in her. She still believed that Manny was telling the truth, despite the impssibilities of it all.

That was a real friend, Manny though. That was love.

* * *

To be continued...


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Joshua stood in the forest outside of the large, seven-floor white building known as Chancellor's House. After he'd lost the girl, he'd gone back to where she had abandoned her knapsack and retrieved her student card.

It wasn't enough to know her face. He wanted to know her name. He needed to know her name if he was to find her and make sure she remembered nothing of what she'd seen.

If only the girl hadn't resisted his telepathy! A small smile began forming across his normally stoic face, as he once again delighted in the brief surprise that had followed when he realized that his telepathy had failed. At his age, it took a lot to surprise him.

Sadly, being resistant to telepathy wouldn't work out well for the girl . He shoved his hands deeper into the pockets of his jeans as he thought. Manouchka. It was a pretty name--a foreign name _and_ a pretty one. He wouldn't think of her like that, though, using her name, making her into a person. He couldn't. He couldn't think of her with a name if he was going to kill her.

He wouldn't kill her immediately. No, Joshua wasnt the type for swift, unplanned actions. First, he'd try telepathy again. The fight against Ansel had tired him. That was probably why Manouchka had been able to resist him; he was too tired. If telepathy failed again, then he'd simply have to kill her, or come up with another way to keep her silent about the murder she'd seen.

There was a pinching in his mouth as his fangs began to descend. He could feel himself salivating at the thought of fresh, warm blood. He could always use another loyal vassal on which to feed. A few bites, a few nibbles, and Manouchka wouldnt be able to resist even a simple command, even if telepathy weren't involved. She wouldn't _want _to resist anything he said. She'd keep his secret if the blood bond were strong enough.

He turned and walked away from residence, back up the hill towards his home.

This Manouchka LaRue was a very lucky girl, he thought. Not every vampire who knew that she'd seen them stab another vampire would be kind enough to protect her. Most of the ones he knew would have simply broken into her apartment and killed her and everyone she knew. The other ones would have toyed with her until she went mad. He was being kind, giving her a chance few others in history ever had.

Joshua laughed, still smiling.

He still couldnt believe she'd resisted his telepathy!

* * *

After a day and a half, Manny didn't know if she should be relieved or worried. The police had come by again. They had processed the scene, Dawson and Forrest explained, but they hadn't found any sign of blood, foul play, or any tracks in the forest but what was supposed to be there. Even if Manny, they told her, continued to maintain that this hadn't been a prank or caused by some substance she had consumed (they hesitated to call it drugs or alcohol, but their meaning was clear) they had no hard evidence to go on. The case was closed.

It didn't make Manny feel better. There was no doubt in her mind that what she had seen really happened. As for the mysterious face at the third-floor window, she couldn't explain it, and she'd written it off as fatigue. What she couldn't write off was her student card reappearing. He knew her name, he knew where she lived, and he knew how to get into her apartment.

She didn't feel _safe_ anymore.

Seeing the funk she was in, her roommates became determined to get her out of the house. If she continued to hide in her bedroom, they told her, not only would she never attend classes again, but she'd continue to be afraid. Only by getting out of the house could she start being normal again.

Tanya flopped into Manny's bedroom. At five-one, she was the shortest person in the house, but with her large blue eyes, curly blonde hair, and sweet disposition, she was also the cutest. Tanya reminded Manny of a Cabbage Patch Doll--a Cabbage Patch Doll who also drank heavily from Thursday to Monday, partied until two am, flirted, and yet was still so shy around boys that her idea of saying something scandalous was admitting that she wanted to have someones babies.

"Happy Halloween!"

Manny groaned. She had completely forgotten that it was Halloween. Last week, she had been bouncing off the walls with excitement for it, but after the events of the past few days, Halloween had been the furthest thing from her mind.

"Do you know what youre going to do?" Tanya had a habit of speaking where she asked a question, and somehow it still sounded like an order. Manny felt a wince coming on as Tanya paused for breath. She talked a mile a minute. "You're going to get dressed up with us, right now, and youre going to come with us to the university pub for some Halloween dancing!"

Her wince turned to a groan that she could not suppress. "Ugh, Tanya, I really don't think that's approp..."

"Of course it is! It's Halloween! It's the only night that you can dress up as whatever you want to be! Besides, we're supposed to be going as a group, remember? What would we be without you?"

Their idea of a Halloween costume had been suggested by Lacey. Every year since Manny had met Lacey, the red-headed girl had dressed up as various deities for Halloween. Though her parents had never allowed Lacey to go trick-or-treating with Manouchka, she'd seen pictures of her friend dressed as lion-headed dogs or winged horses when she was a child, and then as goddess like Artemis, Freya, and Ishtar as a teenager. Lacey had convinced her roommates, with surprisingly little persuasion, to join her and dress up as deities.

Tanya had agreed because she liked the pretty dresses she had seen in Lacey's pictures. Beth had agreed out of a combination of practicality: a toga would keep her cool even while dancing, and because she liked how the toga left flattering cuts of her arms and calves visible.

Manny had agreed because Lacey was her best friend and she wanted to share a Halloween tradition with her.

"Plus," Tanya continued before Manny could think of a counter-argument, "the Halloween party is the Wall's biggest night. Everyone will be there! You're going to be surrounded by people, Manny, even if those people will be dancing and eyeing how great you look in your costume! Nothing can possibly happen to you in front of so many witnesses!"

"It's not even Halloween tonight, it's just that since it's Saturday they're holding the party tonight." Her argument was futile, and Tanya had a good one. If there _was_ a murderer after her--and there had been no sign that there was for a day and a half--then would he risk coming after her when she'd be surrounded by people? She had to start coming out of her room sometime. She could be out in a crowd and still manage to hide in her costume. Who would recognize her?

Besides, she added to herself grumpily, it would get my roommates off my back.

"Okay, Tanya. I'll go."

"Yay!" A sudden warm ball of curves flung itself around her neck and then danced out of her room, leaving her to get ready for the dance.

* * *

Nipissing's campus pub was called the Wall. At first Manny hadn't understood the name, but after seeing it for the first time, she had to agree that it was appropriate. It was in the basement of Nipissing's student center, and to access it one had to travel down a wide stairwell, of which on one side was the ground, and the other was the student council's office. She felt like a mouse scurrying between the bricks of a wall to access her house hence the name, she thought. The Wall.

The line-up at Halloween was ridiculously long, and no amount of her roommates flashing themselves at the bouncer would get them in faster. In fact, it would have gotten them kicked out. After waiting in line for half an hour to get in, Manny had to admit that she was already feeling better. The fresh air had revived her, and she knew that her outfit looked good.

Lacey had dressed up as a fox-spirit from Japan. With her red silk kimono and the gold dust painted over her eyes, she looked suddenly terrifyingly exotic, and the tail she'd found moved with an uncanny realism. Tanya had gone for cute and energetic, dressed in a white dress and wings. She hadn't told anyone the inspiration for a costume, and for the life of her Manouchka hadnt been able to think of any deity who looked like a cherub and was more hyper active than a three year old on sugar. Dark-haired Beth had dressed in a dark purple toga that was held together by very little. She almost looked as attractive as Lacey, Manny though, but Lacey won because she was beautiful without wearing a backless dress or showing off her legs.

Manny's own outfit had been picked out by Lacey. The robe she wore was ochre, set off by the coppery hue of her skin. She'd woven fake flowers into her hair, and carried an ankh. Her feet were freezing in sandals, but when she shifted her weight she could hear her ankle bracelets make beautiful chiming sounds. Manny had decided to dress up as the Egyptian goddess of life, Isis.

The music was blaring as they descended the stairs into the pub. Manny didn't know who the singer was, but the beat was nice. Black lights turned everything blue and off-color. There were a lot of costumes. Manny saw goth vampires dancing with fairies, or pumpkins dancing with Ninja Turtles. She also saw more scantily clad women than she had ever seen before.

"Let's dance!" Tanya grabbed two of them and hauled them out on the dance floor, while Beth went to go and get them a water to share.

Dance they did. Manny didn't recognize any of the songs they were playing, while Tanya was nearly screaming all the lyrics. Between the good humor of her friends and the music, Manouchka could feel herself relax and enjoy herself. She danced until her legs hurt, then shared a brief game of pool with Lacey.

Lacey leaned over the pool table. In the black lights her hair had gone from vibrant red to the color of red from cheesy horror movies--black tinged with red at the edges. She smirked. "Someone's watching you."

"What?" All at once, the old fear returned and she felt herself stiffen, like a deer frozen in headlights.

Lacey snickered. "He's cute, from what I can see, anyway. Broad-shoulders, bangs that you can totally play with, and very nice cheekbones."

"Is it Matt?" The fear was replaced with hope when she realized that she wasn't being stalked, but that she was being checked out. She could feel her heart flutter at the very idea of Matt Aspen noticing her.

"No, regretfully, but he does seem to be just as cute. He's walking over this way. I'm going to go and inspect the pool sticks. I don't think this ones weighted properly for me after all. Just wave if he wants to dance. I say go for it!"

"Lacey!" she hissed, the panic returning. She could hear the footsteps approaching her with purpose, rather than the meandering steps of someone circling the pub. Manny turned around and gulped.

The man in question _was _broad-shouldered and taller than Manny, though since her eyes only came up to his nose, he wasnt as tall as Matthias Aspen. She pegged him as being five-nine, about two inches taller than she. As for his face, she couldnt make that out. He was dressed as the Phantom of the Opera and a mask half-covered his face, turned an eerie shade of electric blue from the black lights. His one eye that was visible was a shade of grey which, without the aid of the black light, might have been green in reality.

"I was wondering if perhaps the goddess Isis danced?" The man held out a gloved hand for her to accept.

His voice had a Scottish accent, still thick. It was almost as impressive as the fact that he knew she was dressed as the goddess Isis.

"Is my costume really that obvious?"

Her question actually made him smile a little, the visible corner of his mouth lifting a little. "No, but I'm familiar with _The Golden Ass_. My name's Joshua." His hand shifted for a handshake instead of being offered for a dance. This time, Manny shook it.

"Manny."

"Please to meet you, Manny. I was serious, you know. Did you want to dance?"

She shrugged, and a strange tingle went up her arm when she realized that she was still holding his hand. Her free hand waved to Lacey, giving her spying friend the sign that everything was kosher and she was going to dance. "Sure."

He escorted her down to the dance floor, making certain not to let go of her hand. The Wall was crowded, and people bumping into them threatened to pull them apart. When they got there, with a dramatic flair he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, drawing his cape with it. Manny thought it was kind of cute.

They were still playing some kind of loud, thrumming music. Despite that, Joshua placed a hand on her hip and took one of her hands in his, as he would have if the music had been a waltz. He was classy. Manny wasn't the least bit shy that they were dancing a quick waltz to a rap song. She reveled in it.

"So why the Phantom of the Opera?" she inquired, needing to yell over the strength of the music. He leaned down, closing the short gap between them, so that he wouldn't have to yell back.

"Because I didn't want you to recognize my face and run screaming for security."

Manouchka's head shot up, her eyes searching his face before she released the scream building in her throat. Yes! She recognized that cut of cheek now, the cleft in his chin (Manny thought shed never like clefts now)! She opened her mouth to scream, even though she knew that her voice might not make a dent in the noise in the room. She doubted that the people dancing around them would even be able to hear her scream.

_Quiet._

The air she held in reserve suddenly began choking her. Manny coughed, trying to get the air out and breathe in again. She had to lean against Joshua to keep herself from falling over. His hand left her hip to stroke her back, lost in the folds of her loose ocher robe, looking for all intents and purposes like he was helping her as she had an asthma attack.

What was that, she wondered. It was a voice, but her ears hadn't heard it. It hadn't been an auditory voice. The command had just bubbled up in her mind, alien and undeniable, and she'd been forced to follow it, swallowing the air she had been about to expel.

"Oh, there, there, Pumpkin. I'm surprised too. You look much prettier dressed as Isis than you did covered in muck and leaves the other night. Now, here's what were going to do. Your friends are on their way over here at the moment, and you're going to tell them that you're going out for a bit of fresh air. You'll meet me outside. Understand?"

Manny's honey-brown eyes narrowed. "Bite me!"

His smile became full-blown. Manny couldn't figure out why. She heard the voice again in her mind, the words suddenly popping into her mind. _Youre going to tell them that everything is fine and then youre going to come out to the patio and meet me out there._

Wait--were those words coming from _him_? She could see Beth and Tanya coming her way, pushing their way through the crowd. Joshua blended into the throng of people surrounding them, easily becoming lost amongst the taller men and women. Manny tried to get control of her mouth, to use her hands to indicate she needed help, but they were already moving of their own accord. The words weren't her own, but an echo of the script Joshua had given her. The hand gestures weren't her own. Her mind felt like she had been pushed to the outskirts, slightly dizzy and sick. Someone was using her like a puppet, and the feeling was not a welcome one.

"I'm really hot, guys. I'm going to go out on the patio for a minute or two to cool off."

"Sure thing," Beth said, raising her glass in a mock toast.

After the cramped, humid air inside the pub, outside was chillier than normal. Manny felt like she was walking through a haze, until she reached him, waiting for her at the door. Then the fog that clouded her mind cleared a little--enough so that when his arm reached around her and drew her to his side, she noticed that his body was warm, and that his aftershave was natural and subtle, rather than the fake-perfume so many boys in her classes favored.

She hated him. Her hate tasted sour in her mouth.

Why did he have to be so cute?

"That wasn't so bad, was it?" Manny tried to open her mouth a respond, but no voice would come out yet. He kept her vocal chords tight under his mental thumb. Instead she lifted her upper lip and snarled at him. He laughed in delight, and the laugh was surprisingly earnest. "Adorable. Perfectly adorable!"

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a remote starter for his car. Up the hill to the main road, a red car flashed its lights. Manouchka didn't know what type of car it was exactly, but judging from how low it was to the ground and the sleek shape, she knew it would be a recklessly fast one. With his arm around her body, he helped her up the hill, and it took her until she reached the top to realize that, while she still couldn't scream from the pressure he was exerting over her mind, she was walking under her own power.

Her muscles tightened and she tried to bolt away from him, jabbing her elbow into his ribs, but it felt like she'd hit a brick wall. The man had muscle, she'd give him that, and the grip that his arm had around her shoulders turned painful. Her body was still bruised from her tumble down the hill behind residence and he seemed to be applying pressure to the right area of her shoulder so that he crippled her with pain, but not cause more damage to her body. She wanted to gasp from the shock of the pain, but his mind was still controlling her vocal chords, and so she withered in silence, feet skidding on the wet autumn pavement as she tried to stay standing and not fall limp.

"Trying to run away from me would be a very bad idea." He steadied her on her feet on the passenger side of the car. "Now, Manny, _stay_."

The command made her head actually hurt. She growled at him and wished her throat would move enough so that she could spit in that pretty grey eye. No, she realized, it wasn't grey anymore. It had become that turquoise-purple shade after she'd tried to elbow him in the ribs and make a getaway. His eyes, she realized, changed with his moods. They were grey when he was being either neutral, flirtatious, or underhanded; Manny wasn't certain which emotion had been predominate in the Wall. When they were that deep, blue-tinted shade of purple, he was mad.

She felt a tiny surge of pride that she had succeeded in making him mad. He might be able, somehow, to make her body do things that she didn't want to, but she could press his buttons back!

He went around to the driver's side of the vehicle and got in, then leaned over and opened the other door for her. "Get in," he ordered from inside the dim car.

There was no pinch of pain in her mind this time. Why wasn't he commanding her to do it, like he had before? She wondered if maybe he knew that his last command had hurt. Was he showing signs of being recalcitrant, she wondered.

No, Manny concluded. He's an asshole. He's a murdering, fast-car-driving, commanding, asshole.

Her indecision apparently vexed him. He peered up at her from the driver's seat and slipped off his mask, tossing it into the back seat. Manny bit her lip when she saw his face up close. Even if she hated the cleft in his chin, simply because it was _his_, she couldn't deny that the sloping, angular cheekbones, the long nose, dark-lashed eyes, and the way his brown hair pooled neatly around his face was fetching.

Matt Aspen, look out, there's a boy on campus hotter than you are. The man couldn't have been any older than Manny. She studied his features a moment longer. In fact, it was possible that he might even be younger than she was. Put into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt with an updated hair cut and the man might have been able to pass for as young as sixteen.

He'd be cuter if he could smile. Instead his mouth had a tight, pinched look, like he'd eaten something he didn't like or was stuck in constant disapproval of the world around him.

"I'm parked illegally," he said, his rough accent thickening. This time he didnt give her an option. _Get in the car, Manny._

She climbed into the car, gritting her teeth. Once she was inside and buckled up, the mental hand that had kept her from speaking relaxed. She flexed her tongue and swallowed with relief. Being able to swallow had never felt so good! He wasn't driving away yet. It was like he was waiting for her waiting to see if she'd bolt or not. She coughed experimentally and licked her lips. He'd eased up enough that she had complete control of her voice again.

"How did you know I was going to be here tonight?"

"I've been watching you, keeping an eye on you. I heard you make plans with that blonde roommate of yours." He shrugged, as if what hed said was no more important than the weather, and just as disinteresting. Manny felt her face grow warm with anger, but also felt relief. At least he wasn't lying about spying on her. If there were no other good qualities in him, at least he had honesty. "It seemed like a good plan to abduct you."

"Why?"

"We can discuss that when we get home. Since I still don't think I trust you enough to know where I live, I'd like you to go to sleep now, Manny."

She laughed curtly. Manny didn't feel the least bit tired. Her whole body was pumped with adrenaline. "I don't think so."

For a moment again, that pinched mouth relaxed and the edges curled up in a faint smile. Manny wondered what he found so funny, and she studied his eyes, trying to determine what color his eyes became when he was happy. If there was a change from being angry, she couldn't see it. Maybe the smile was just a feint.

"You might be able to resist some of my more complicated telepathic commands, but it's nearly impossible to resist one where it's one of the body's basic functions."

Manny felt confused, the thoughts tumbling in her head. Telepathy? She'd resisted? She'd followed him everywhere he told her to, like a little terrier! There was nothing resistant about it!

He reached out and she flinched back, raising her hands to protect herself. "Dont you dare touch me, you!"

But his fingertips pressed gently against her forehead, over her third eye. _Sleep, Manny._

Her body offered no resistance as her eyes closed and her train of thought vanished into the darkness.

* * *

Joshua pulled slowly away from the curb. He didn't want to attract any attention to himself. Paused at a stop light, he glanced over at Manouchka.

She was a cute girl, he decided. Not adorable, like her blonde roommate, and not hauntingly beautiful like the other women he'd known over the years. She was somewhere in between, making her completely average.

It was, frankly, a little refreshing.

And what a little spitfire she was! Joshua had met girls who would have ripped him limb from limb for getting close to them because they were so aggressive, but she put on a pleasant face that hid a bit of a potty mouth and a mean elbow. His side hurt a little from where she'd struck him, though he knew her elbow hurt much more. She was nave, but when she knew she had made a mistake he had no doubt that she'd become a stubborn hellion to fix it.

Fast asleep in the passenger seat, she looked helpless. Goddess help him, he actually felt bad for what he was going to do. She wasn't like most of the others. This was a different scenario. She was going to be forced into it against her will, and and he felt bad for it.

His hands tightened on the steering wheel as he left the stop sign behind.

He didn't have time to feel bad about it. He had other people to think about, people whose secrets needed to be kept. _His _secrets needed to be kept. He wasn't going to let one little girl stand in the way. He never had, and he never would.

Joshua's tongue stroked the fangs that were quickly descending. He had used up a lot of energy using telepathy on Manny. Sleep had been the easiest, and he knew it would have been, but it had taken more energy than he had suspected to keep her quiet. Her mind had been screaming the whole time, but more than that...

He sighed at the very thought and pushed the matter away. It returned when he wondered what Manouchka's reaction would be. How would she react when she found out that she would have been able to fully resist his telepathy if she hadn't secretly wanted to give in?

She wanted to climb into the car, to see where it went. She wanted to meet him out on the balcony of the Wall because it felt like a secret tryst. She wanted to lie to her friends because she wanted to get away from them. She wanted to not scream because she thought he was cute, and because she knew the loud music would have drowned it out anyway. She could have resisted each command he'd given her fully, save for sleep, if she hadn't wanted to agree to it subconsciously so much.

Joshua knew he'd have to be careful with her in the future. He wouldn't tell her that she was capable of fully resisting his telepathy. He'd let her think that he could exert full command over her actions because it would keep her in line until the blood pact was sealed. That would be for the best. If she found out that with enough force she could even come to resist the basic command to sleep, he doubted that he'd be able to get her to cooperate long enough for the blood pact to establish.

A human girl wandering the streets of North Bay screaming about murders, vampires, and Joshua's connection to both was the last thing he needed.

His tongue continued to stroke his fangs as he drove. Up until the sensitive tip, the pressure was comforting, but he was so hungry that stroking the tip of his fangs was nothing but a cruel joke. Patience, old man. You can feed off of her when you get home, where it's properly done. You're not going to risk getting blood all over the inside of your car.

He glanced at her again, lips parted and eyelids fluttering as she quickly and unnaturally entered REM sleep. No, if she found out about her natural talents, there was no way he'd be able to control her long enough. She was too frightened, too nave, too stubbornin a word: too _human_.

But, he admitted, it would be interesting...

* * *

To be continued...


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Manny rolled over and realized that she wasn't in her own bed when she didn't hit the edge of the skinny Nipissing mattress. She jolted awake when she remembered that the night had ended with her abduction, and falling asleep in a stranger's car. Manny sat upright in bed so quickly that she went dizzy, and her eyes didn't have enough time to adjust to the lamp beside the bed.

She looked around, blinking rapidly and holding her aching head. The clock under the lamp read six am. Was that six am, October thirty-first, or later? How long had she been sleeping?

She was in the middle of a large bed. 'King size,' she thought, thinking of no other bed in which three people could possibly fit. There was an end table at both sides. The comforter on the bed was a masculine shade of brown, and the sheets a little more ostentatious in gold silk.

Joshua sat in a chair by the bed, legs folded and a book spread across his lap. His arms were folded across the arms of the chair, and he was watching her rather than reading. She couldn't quite see his expression and hoped that her eyes would adjust soon.

"Good morning."

"What day is it?"

A purr might have been his form of a light chuckle, noticing she'd already read the clock. "It's six a.m. on Halloween. You've only been asleep about seven hours. How do you like the bed?"

"It's squishy."

Joshua nodded, leaning back in his chair with amusement. "It is. I don't like to indulge much, but I do like sleep. I like the way the blankets and comforter seem to suspend me."

She arched her eyebrow, wondering where he was going with such idle chatter. "You're not really Scottish, are you?"

"Not by birth," he admitted, fingering his nose. She wondered if he considered his nose un-Scottish and then realized he was gesturing to the absence of pale skin or freckles, both stereotypes of Scots. "I would have been born in modern-day Israel, but I spent the last twenty years of my life in northern Scotland, on the shores of the ocean."

Twenty? Apparently he was older than he looked.

"What about you? LaRue is a French last name. I'm not certain from whence Manouchka hails."

She was well aware of exactly how crazy this conversation was. They were having a conversation about the etymology of their names, and he was a murderer. Wondering if perhaps he was a clinically insane murderer, she decided that answering the questions and staying on his good side would be for the best.

"My family came over from South Africa generations ago, and we settled in Quebec. They changed their names to a French one, LaRue. My parents wanted to get back to their home roots, so that's why I have a more traditional first name, but a French last name. I'm not actually French. My family lives in Toronto, and I can barely speak a word of the language."

"And your friends call you Manny?" She nodded. He shifted in his chair, slouching, and she felt her body jerk in surprise that he had actually moved.

How could he be so still when he sat? It was unnatural! When Manny sat she still fidgeted: swinging a leg back and forth, twiddling her thumbs, or playing with her hair. He didn't. He only moved if he had to. Slouching as he was in his chair, legs outstretched and arms folded, he looked pleased with himself, like a cat that had stolen cream and gotten away with it. She gulped, knowing very well that she was the cream.

His lips curled up in a smile that was neither kind, nor real. It resembled more of a grimace, revealing the edges of straight teeth without bringing color to his face. "You're afraid."

The statement sounded like an accusation, as if it were unnatural for her to be afraid. She exploded at him, arms waving in the force of it. "Of _course_ I'm afraid! I watched you stab another man in the heart! Then you chased me down! _Then _you threatened me and broke into my apartment while I was in the shower! And _then_, last night, you kidnapped me and somehow managed to knock me out! Why in the world shouldn't I be afraid, waking up in a stranger's bed after he forced me into his car?!"

Joshua was silent until he was certain that she was finished. Her eyes had adjusted to the light to see that during her confession, something she'd said or done had bothered him enough that his eyes were once again that strange shade of sapphire-purple. "You asked me yesterday what I wanted with you." He ignored the shudder he saw run through her body at his statement. "The truth is that I wanted to know how much you had seen. Clearly, you saw me kill Ansel."

"Is it too late for me to take back that comment?" he heard her mumble, forcing him to squash a smile before it could show.

She was afraid--he could her heart beating, detect the faint flushing of her face, see the faint hairs on the back of her arms rise, and he could smell it rising from her skin--but she was still making jokes. He liked that about her. He admired the ability to find humor in even the worst situation. Joshua doubted that he would have lasted as many years as he had without having that ability himself, even if it rarely showed.

"Did you see what happened to his body?"

Manny arched an eyebrow. "You moved his body didn't you?"

There was no increase her heart beat. Either she was a skilled liar, or she was telling the truth. Judging from the way the tempo of her heart actually slowed down, no doubt from curiosity, he was inclined to believe her. She didn't know what had happened to Ansel. She hadn't seen it shrivel up and mummify into a desiccated corpse. That was good.

"Yes, I moved his body," he replied, easing her worries. The last thing he wanted was for her to jump to conclusions, thinking that Ansel had suddenly survived and gone looking for him. Her shoulders eased a little. "I just wanted to try and trick you. So, you didn't see me move it, but you knew I did. How?"

"I..." Manny had been about to simply blurt out the answer, but she suddenly stopped. Joshua could hear her heartbeat pick up again, and this time her cheeks darkened with color. "I... I may have told the police."

His grimace tightened. He'd heard her screaming for the police, but didn't know if it had been a ruse or not. Apparently she had gotten the police involved after all.

"Look, I'm sorry that I told them! It was completely and utterly my fault, but I can't undo telling them! I swear I won't tell anyone else, just _please_ take me back home without hurting me!"

He ignored the plea. Let her stew for awhile, he thought. She'd be more compliant if she thought that her life was on the line. If she started getting so scared that she threatened to faint, or worse, he'd swear upon whatever made her feel safe that he wouldn't kill her. "What did you tell them?"

"Exactly what I told you. I brought them to where I saw you fighting with..."

"Ansel."

"...with Ansel, but they couldn't find anything to prove that either of you had been there."

Joshua could hear the disappointment in her voice. His own tone smoothed from commanding, to gentle query. "They didn't believe you, did they?"

Manny's tone was sharp. "Would you have believed me when you went there and couldn't even find a footprint? So one started telling me that maybe it was some kind of early Halloween prank, while the other one was suggesting that maybe I was a bit tired or that someone might have slipped something in my drink, asking me about drugs or alcohol. It was completely and utterly degrading!"

"Did anyone believe you?"

She opened her mouth and then closed it. "No."

This time her heart rate shot up. He smiled wryly and pulled out of his chair and leaned closer to her. In the light of the room, the lamp made his teeth look golden yellow, and made his ash-blonde hair glitter. The effect was unnerving, as if he were sculpted out of gold, but worst of all were those sapphire-violet eyes boring into hers. "You're laying to me, Manny."

Her eyes widened, but she wouldnt let go of the lie. "I am not!"

"Yes, you are. I can tell when someone's lying to me. I can practically _smell_ it coming off of them. It's revolting. You're lying to me. You're trying to protect someone."

His guess was right. She looked away, wrapping her arms around herself to try and keep warm. "All right, I am lying, but I can't tell you who believes me. She's my friend. I have to try and protect her! If it helps, I don't really think that she means it, she's just trying to cheer me up. If our places were reversed, I don't think I'd be able to accept something as big as this without proof." Manny lifted her head and he was surprised to see tears glimmering faintly in her eyes. "You can interrogate me all you want, but I won't tell you who she is."

"That's all right." He resumed his previous sitting position. "I don't have to interrogate you. I have other ways of finding out." The smile that pulled his mouth upwards was the grimace again, and it made her shiver in fear at the sight of it. "You remember how I made you dance, or be silent? I can reach into your mind and pluck the name out if I so wish. You don't need to tell me."

Her eyes widened in surprise, but she stubbornly lifted her chin. "If you can really reach into my thoughts and pull out whatever information you want, then you don't need me to answer _any_ of your questions."

"Damn it." He cursed himself. She'd called his bluff. If she were any other human girl, her mind would be as open as a book to him. He could try to force his way into his mind if he was really curious about her friend's name, but such a maneuver was risky. He could shred apart the very fibres of her being if he wasn't careful enough, leaving her a mindless mass of flesh. Joshua wasn't prepared to take that chance... not just yet.

He only hoped that his arrogance, forgetting that he couldn't follow through on his threats with this individual, hadn't just cost him whatever other information he needed to know. "What were the names of the police officers you talked to?"

"Why? Do you want to kill them too?"

Aggression made her voice sharp. Joshua was beginning to wonder if maybe hed gone about his interrogation completely the wrong way. Manny would be much more cooperative, he assumed, if she hadn't gotten it worked into her mind that he was the bad guy. If she just thought that he was a killer, Joshua could work with it. He _was_ a killer, but he wasn't the bad guy.

He was on her side. If he wasn't, she never would have made it through her first night. The Council didn't like people breaking their rules, even inadvertently. The best thing to do here was to lie to her, but tell her at least a little bit of the truth so that she knew how dangerous the situation really was.

"I don't want to kill them. I want to know who they were so that I'll know whether or not they're going to come after you and kill you." His words caught her off guard, making her freeze. She couldn't think of a snappy comeback. Joshua pressed on before she could recover. "The truth is that the man you saw me kill was dangerous. He could have allies, maybe even friends, in the surrounding area. If they found out that I killed Ansel, they're going to come after me. If they found that you saw him die, they're going to come after you."

"Me? But I saw you kill him! Wouldn't I _help_ them by putting you behind bars?"

"Maybe if they actually wanted me in jail. They don't. They want me dead. It's a conspiracy, Manny. I just want to make sure that you didn't talk to anyone in the conspiracy. If you did, then we need to get you out of here, and fast." His eyes glittered keenly. "Now, to whom did you talk?"

Her voice was meek. Apparently she'd bought the story. "Their surnames were Dawson and Forrest."

Joshua knew Forrest. The man was a Daybreaker--one of the few in the city. Despite that, he'd not tell anyone how close Manouchka had been to accidentally stumbling upon the Night World. T he secret was safe with him.

"Manny," he began, sliding from his seat and sitting on the edge of the king-sized bed. "You asked me not to kill you, and promised me that you wouldn't tell anyone else in return."

She nodded, wide-eyed.

"That's what I want, too. I don't want to kill you. The problem is that I can't guarantee that you're not going to double cross me--and you know that the same goes for me. You know, don't you, that you can't trust me?"

Manny nodded again, and he noticed that her bottom lip was quivering. Despite her earlier jokes, she really was afraid of him. Joshua mentally sighed, wishing he didn't have to drive such points home. He reached over, and felt a strange sensation of pride when she didn't flinch away from his hand. She was scared, but she was a brave little human, wasn't she? His hand patted her knee through the covers.

"The truth is that you _can_ trust me, but it's best if you don't. I mean it when I say that I don't want to kill you. When I threatened you, I was being rash, but if threatening you is what it takes to get you to listen to me and pay attention, then you can bet I'll do it again. What I propose is a way for us to know that we can trust each other in this matter. If either one of us breaks our word to the other, not only will the other know, but the other will be punished so thoroughly death would be merciful."

She laughed curtly. "And that's supposed to make me _want_ to enter this agreement with you?"

"Are you feeling comfortable enough with me to let me make you breakfast?"

His sudden tenderness confused her. Manny decided she wasn't comfortable enough with him yet. She didn't understand him, and as he had pointed out, she certainly didn't _trust _him. For all she knew, he could be about to try and poison her with food.

Manny's stomach rumbled loudly. On the other hand, she was famished. Even a piece of toast would suffice. If she were in the kitchen with him, surely there was no way that he could manage to poison _toast_

He was watching her closely, and his eyes were bright blue now. Without hesitation Manny knew that blue was for when he was laughing at her. She rubbed her offending stomach, knowing that he had heard it. "I think I could manage to eat something," she admitted.

She followed him down to the kitchen, which turned out to be incredibly modern. She sat in the island in the middle of the room, admiring the stone-worked floors and watching him, always watching him, from the corner of her eye. He pulled out toast from a bread box and a toaster and dug around in the kitchen while waiting for it to pop.

"I'm afraid I only have water or orange juice, with the pulp."

"Orange juice is fine," she assured Joshua, once again struck by how odd normal conversation seemed with him.

"What would you like on your toast? We have margarine, blueberry jam, orange marmalade..."

"Do you have any peanut butter?"

"We should."

A smile began tugging at her lips, watching him search his own kitchen for peanut butter. It was kind of cute, the way he was trying to make her happy. When he bent over into the fridge to pull out the orange juice, she had a wonderful view of what his jeans were hiding. Manny frowned when she realized she was checking him out, making her wonder how long it took for Stockholm syndrome to set in.

"We have crunchy peanut butter." The sound of the toast popping was loud in the kitchen, startling her.

"Crunchy peanut butter's fine."

Joshua turned back and glanced at her. "A bit agreeable arent you? Everything's just fine.| She saw that his eyes were still blue and smirked at him, knowing he was teasing her. "What are you really thinking about?"

"That for a cold-blooded killer youre really quite charming," she sighed, "making me wonder how long it takes before prisoners identify with their captives."

She had spoken without thinking and worried that she'd been a little too honest with him, but much to her surprise--and to his--he burst out laughing. The sound of it surprised her, because for his body size and voice, it was higher than she'd thought. In books, didnt men always have deep chuckles or rumbling laughs? Not Joshua, it seemed. It took her a moment, but she decided his laugh reminded her of the comedian Jon Stewart. Did that mean, she wondered, that he was really laughing, rather than just putting on a show?

He brought the toast and the peanut butter to the kitchen island, opening the container. Manouchka was about to protest that she was perfectly capable of buttering her own toast, but he was already doing it. "Manny, lets not kid ourselves. The syndrome says you identify with your captor, not that you think he's cute--and you do think I'm cute. You thought so from last night, even though you could only see half my face, and that was why you were willing to dance with me."

"Was not!"

Joshua passed her the plate of toast with a grin. "You're a terrible liar, Manny. Now, shut up and eat your toast while I pour you some juice."

Once he had poured the juice, he sat at the island across from her. Manny noted that he only had a glass of orange juice for himself. When she gave him an inquisitive look, he only shrugged. "I don't really eat breakfast. Back to the important matter, now that we won't have to deal with your stomach interrupting us. I believe very strongly in witchcraft, Manny. What I'm proposing is actually a witch's ceremony which would bind our oaths together. It would render me incapable of hurting you, and you incapable of speaking about what you saw me do."

"Witches? Magic? You expect me to believe that that will really work?"

He shrugged, as if he had anticipated such derision of his beliefs. "Even if you dont believe that it will work, I will, so I'll believe that you won't be telling everyone you meet that you watched me kill someone, or what I look like, and I won't risk hurting you for fear of punishment for breaking my end of the oath."

The peanut butter tasted heavy in her mouth. She struggled to swallow. What he was proposing wasn't as comforting as she had hoped it would have been. Manny shook her head. "Witchcraft isnt real."

"Yes, and I'm certain that you in all of your--what? Twenty years?--know everything."

"I'm only eighteen," she sighed.

"Because that makes it so much better to have one so young be so delusional and sure of herself." He watched her huff up in anger. "The fact of the matter is that both of us have to agree to do it. If you don't want to agree to that, and you don't want me to kill you, then there's only one option left. Ever heard of a blond bond?"

Her expression became puzzled. "Is that what the Scottish call a blood oath? You know, like, where we both cut our hand and press them together and make a promise?"

"It's very similar to that, but there's nothing Scottish about the idea. We exchange blood, and if we do it enough times, we won't want to lie to each other." She seemed as thrilled by that idea as she did by the prospect of the witch-ceremony. Joshua smiled, and this time did nothing to hide that his teeth were sharper than normal. A shiver ran down his spine as he let his fangs descend, like a cat yawning. "It's something which my kind has been known to do."

Joshua could tell the exact moment when the thought: _Oh good lord, he's a vampire!_ went through her mind. The toast raised to her mouth fell and landed peanut butter side down. He reached out with his mind, ready to stop the scream before it happened. She choked on the piece of bread she was chewing from his tight grip, and he relaxed it a little.

"Sorry."

"No," she wheezed, reaching for her juice. "I really was about to scream."

"You're not going to argue with me then, about how vampires, like witches, cant exist?"

She shook her head. "No. I would, but for some reason that totally defies logic, I believe you." She began listing things off on her fingers. "You're unnaturally pretty, and Keifer Sutherland was unnaturally pretty in _The Lost Boys_. Your eyes change color, and while I do know some people whose eyes shift from grey to blue, I've never heard of anyone whose eyes change hue as rapidly or as drastically as yours. You move unnaturally fast. You show no remorse about having to kill that man. You somehow floated up to my bedroom window to put my student card on my pillow, and you have telepathy. And some very sharp teeth. If this is just a joke, then its such a thorough one I don't mind being caught in it."

"It's not a joke. And, like the murder, you're not allowed to tell anyone."

"Dont worry. No one would believe me."

She was smart, he decided, but she was also wrong. If she stumbled upon the right person, they would believe her, and they'd kill her for it.

"So then you want to _drink_ my blood?"

He couldn't help it as his grin widened. Her tone was mildly disgusted, but the fact that she had not shot him down right off the bat might mean she was open to the idea. "Actually," he admitted in a sultry purr, "I already fed off of you. I did it while you were asleep, and gave you a bit of mine in return. The first step towards the bond is already intact."

"You _fed_ off of me?" Joshua had apparently made her mad. She was glaring at him fiercely, and he thought she looked like a disheveled cat when she was angry. If he was human, he probably would have been afraid from the pierce of her voice, but since he wasn't, the otherwise intimidating tone was simply rendered endearing. What could a human girl like Manny ever do to hurt him? "While I was _asleep_?"

Manny was furious. He had fed on her while she was sleeping?! She suddenly lunged across the table and slapped his shoulder. Her palm itched and tingled from slapping him. "As if violating my mind wasn't enough and making me do whatever you wanted me too, now you're... snuggling up to my body when I'm unconscious and forcing me to drink your blood!"

"That's how I like to feed. I don't like it when my food fights back."

She huffed up further. Now she was being called food! She pushed her plate away. "I'm not hungry anymore. I want to go home. Now. Vampire or not, your prisoner is tired of being complacent."

"I'll take you home so long as you tell me which you would prefer doing. If you want to do the ceremony, I'll try to find a witch, but if one isn't available, or if you would prefer, we can do the blood exchange."

"Witch ceremony," she hissed. "Now take me home."

* * *

To be continued...

Still is deleting my quotation marks... any suggestions?


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: **Contains spoliers to Daughters of Darkness and Secret Vampire. I miss those books. They've been packed away on me. :(

Joshua pulled his red sports car up to the front door of Chancellor's House. He draped his arm over the passenger headrest as he turned to look at her. "Just remember what I told you. Not a word of this to anybody. If your roommates asked what happened to you last night, you hooked up with me and came to my place. We had breakfast and then I dropped you off."

She hadn't spoken to him since her last demand to be returned home. Now she looked over at him with a sour expression. "Thanks for ruining my good name. I'm not the type to hook up with guys in bars. Do me a favor and don't call on me until you've found a witch to do this thing. I don't really want to see you again unless it's necessary."

"No second date, then?"

A strange feeling of pleasure spread over his face, like a warm blush, when he saw her smile faintly. Apparently she appreciated humor in dire situations as much as he did. "We haven't even had a first date--and you won't get one from me, so do'nt even think about asking!"

"Manny don't forget that I'll be keeping an eye on you, just to make sure you don't tell on me before this bond is complete, one way or the other. Be on your best behavior, will you?" She was about to try and argue with him, but something in his face stopped her. He was threatening her, but he was warning her too. He was scared for her, and she wasn't entirely sure why. "Beware of people who will try to trick you into telling them what you know. Sometimes they'll try to take it from your mind, but I think that my blood has given you enough protection that no one but me should be able to influence your thoughts."

"Your blood can do that? Keep my mind safe from other vam... others like you?"

He nodded. "Remember what I told you about the conspiracy, Manny? What I do, I do for your protection and not just for my own."

"Somehow I doubt that _you_ drinking _my_ blood was for my own protection if the benefits were from _you_ forcing your blood into _my_ unconscious body."

"Stop being so bitter about that! I thought it would be better that way because then you wouldn't be afraid, and you wouldn't have to be grossed out; human beings may benefit from a small amount of vampire blood, but your bodies arent designed to take it."

"I have every right to be bitter!" she snapped at him. "I don't know who made you, but clearly they never forced you to drink their blood without asking you first. It's a violation!"

Manouchka expected some kind of quick retort. When she didn't get one, she glanced over at him, thinking for a moment that perhaps she'd won their argument. Maybe he'd even apologize for doing it!

By the light coming from the residence she could see the change in his face. He was staring at her, his eyes quickly darkening. He was getting mad. She could feel the fear rising up like bile in her throat. What would he do to her if she made him angry while she was trapped in the car with him?

"My God," she breathed out, realizing what had made him mad. "They _did_ force you, didn't they?"

He gritted his teeth. Damn the perception of this woman! No, he corrected himself. _Girl._ She was only eighteen. She was too observant for her own good! She was an English student, damn it. Wasn't she supposed to be good with _books_ rather than _people_?

_Get out!_ Joshua had meant for it to be vocal, but he was too mad. It was a command, and one not to be ignored. He'd slipped into telepathy, perhaps forgetting that she was resistant to it, or perhaps subconsciously knowing that such a fierce command would feel like a brand striking at her mind. He didn't particularly care when she flinched away from him, wincing with pain. _Get out of the car now_.

Manny didn't need a third warning. She bolted from the car so fast that the door slammed shut behind her and bounced back open before the lock could catch.

* * *

"Oh my god! Manny!"

Tanya's gleeful squeal made the headache left behind by Joshua's telepathy feel ten times worse. The roommate in question skidded around the corner from the living room, slippers making her slide on the kitchen floor. She reminded Manny of a large Labrador puppy coming around the corner.

She jumped on Manouchka with such force that the other girl nearly fell into the wall. "Manny! We were worried about you! We _totally_ almost called the police looking for you! Who was that man you left with? It was the same one you were dancing with, wasn't it? He was so cute! And masked, and mysterious, just like the real Phantom!"

Tanya was not exactly an English major.

"The real Phantom of the Opera was supposed to be a monster, Tans," corrected Beth, coming around the corner behind her friend. Her dark eyes studied Manny's face. "You look like a wreck, hon. Tanya, why don't you let go of her so that poor Manny can actually talk? She can tell us what happened while I make up some hot chocolate. It won't be as good as one of Lacey's teas, but it'll put some color back on your face."

"I don't really want to talk about it, Beth."

Even as she said it, she was coming to the conclusion that she'd have to tell them about it sometime or another. If she pushed it off now, they'd jump to conclusions. Even though she really wanted to crawl into bed and try to forget what had happened to her, if she told them now then at least it would be over and done with. Manouchka sighed.

"Where's Lacey?" she asked, thinking that if she was going to relive the day, she was only going to relive it once.

"Lacey went out with friends. Something about a religious retreat. She won't be back until the second."

"Oh." The house felt empty now, without Lacey. Manny could smell the hot chocolate Beth was making her, but now she craved Lacey's homemade tea. She craved Lacey's arms around her, making her feel safe. She craved Lacey's red hair and adorable size and they way she'd sing and make Manny forget the bad things.

'She hadn't even told her that she was going out. Why? Did she not want her to know? Was she trying to keep something from me?'

Manny felt cold. After years of friendship, were they falling apart?

Over hot chocolate and some fruit Tanya chopped up, she told them what Joshua had instructed her to relay. They let her speak without really interrupting, and just assumed her grumpiness was because she was dirty and hungry. Luckily, they hadn't been privy to her conversation with the police, and so they never made the connection between the description of the murderer and her description of Joshua after Tanya begged her for it.

"So," Tanya said, her eyebrows drawing together, "you agree he's cute, but when you got to his place..."

"I barely even made it there. I fell asleep in the car on the way there. I think it was from all the emotional stress of having that awful prank played on me."

"Not me." Tanya's voice was a purr and her blue eyes half-closed as she thought of Joshua. "Mm, if I'd gone home with him, nothing in this world could have made me tired! I'd be having his babies all night!"

Manouchka wondered what Tanya would have done if she had woken up and found out that Joshua had drunk her blood. Given Joshua's looks and how smitten Tanya seemed with him, she probably would have been upset that he hadn't been willing to get that close with him while she was awake. Tanya probably would have offered him her neck again, right there at the kitchen table.

'That's why he's so handsome!' His good looks, the way his eyes changed, even the smooth sound of his voice and the accent, were all meant to draw in prey. Moreover, he had groomed himself to enhance the gifts his vampiracy had given him. His genes hadn't made his hair frame his face so flatteringly, nor given him the clothes he had worn.

Beth rolled her eyes and decided to ignore the comment. "So, do you like him? He must still like you, since he made you breakfast. Are you going to call him?"

She didn't want to have anything to do with him, but, as they had rehearsed, she said: "He told me that he'll call me in a few days. We'll probably go and hang out some night."

Tanya squealed and giggled again, clapping her hands in a one-woman cheering squad. Then she stopped and tapped her chin. "His own house, hm? I wonder how old he is."

"Not that much older than we are. Really, he looks like he could be as young as seventeen, but what seventeen year old has his own house?"

Tanya's blue eyes glittered and she leaned against Beth beside her on the small couch. "Ooh, Beth! Maybe he's an orphan! Maybe his parents died when he was younger and left him a big house somewhere in town! Or maybe he's a super genius in university here and his parents are so loaded that they bought him his own house rather than sending him to residence!"

Beth's smile was full of warmth for the small girl, but her tone was snide. "Notice how she can only think of positive things? She doesn't think that perhaps he's a bank robber and that he has a nice house because he's killed or robbed thousands of people."

"My brain is too pure for thoughts like that!" Tanya exclaimed, agreeing with Beth. "Anyway, if you won't go out with him, I will. So there!"

As Manouchka retreated to bedroom, her stomach still warm from hot chocolate and her heart missing her best friend, she told herself that Tanya could have him. When she did, the feeling was replaced almost immediately by regret. Would she really throw her sweet friend to a monster and a bully like Joshua?

* * *

"Manny! Someone's at the door for you!"

Sunday night, Halloween night, and all Manny wanted to do was to edit her paper for Professor McGugan. She'd been so distracted by the events of the past few days that the assignment had slipped her mind. As she didn't want to repeat the course, she'd resolved herself to ignoring the horror movie marathons her friends were watching to sit down and correct as much of the paper as she possibly could.

"Tell them I'm busy!'

Tanya peeked her head around the corner. "Are you sure? One of them's real cute! The other one is a really pretty lady. They're apparently Canadore students and they want to talk to you about that prank that was played on you the night before."

She gritted her teeth. Couldn't anyone leave her _alone_ about that?! The police, then Joshua, and now perfect strangers!

Her anger was replaced when fear crashed down upon her, turning her skin so cold that goosebumps broke out along the forearms braced upon her desk. She glanced at the window, but could only see trees and the parking lot. There was no sign of Joshua, but he'd promise hed be watching her. As a vampire, how far away did he have to be before he _couldn't _see or hear her? Could he be sitting out of her line of sight, directly underneath her window, listening to their conversation?

"They say that their friends with Lacey and that they already know what happened," Tanya continued from the doorway, "so you won't have to tell them everything about what happened."

It was saying Lacey's name that made her nod and ask Tanya if she could direct them to her room. She wasn't going to greet them in the kitchen, where Tanya and Beth could overhear their conversation. She didn't want them dragged any further into this mess with Joshua.

As she waited for her visitors, Manny struggled to come to terms with the anger she felt towards Lacey. She loved Lacey because Lacey believed in her. Even though Manny was playing along with the police--and Joshua--saying that it was a prank, Lacey didn't doubt her. At the moment, her love was being overshadowed by anger towards her roommate. She would have preferred Lacey thinking it was a prank like everyone else if it meant that she kept it to herself. Instead, Lacey had been sharing her story with other people!

How could Lacey do that? If they believed the story, then Manny was going to have Joshua to deal with. If they didn't believe her, she was going to be ridiculed by perfect strangers. She'd become the laughing stock of the university!

The girl who came around the corner was the prettiest young lady Manny had ever seen. She could have been a year or two younger than Manouchka, especially given her height. Small and delicate, she easily could have been pixie-like, like Tanya, but there was nothing delicate about her face or the way she walked. She strode with an air of purpose, her head held high. She moved gracefully, like a trained dancer, her back straight with poise and passion. Slanted emerald-eyes gave her a slightly mischievous appearance, but her gaze was penetrating rather than jovial, despite the smile on her face. Curly red hair, the color of newly minted copper, framed her face and cheeks and completed the look.

She _could_ have been an elf from the moors of Ireland or Scotland, but instead Manny saw too much of Joshua in her. She was a vampire. The pride, the grace, the intent expression of her face and the intensity in her eyes--there was no denying it.

One vampire Manny could have handled. She might have even been able to handle two, if the second vampire that walked into her small bedroom wasnt an exact duplicate of Joshua.

Ash blonde hair, cut shorter in the back and sides but no less styled, topped off a lithe, tall body. He was taller than Joshua in height, but smaller in width. Joshua's shoulders were the broad shoulders of someone who might have done heavy lifting his whole life. This boy was the slender, stocky build of a lightweight fighter. His eyes were blue, but flashed grey when he saw her, as mercurial as Joshua's. They had the same chin, lips, and cheekbones, but his nose was straight, while she'd noticed Joshuas had the pronounced bump of someone who had had their nose broken repeatedly.

The main difference between them, however, was that this boy walked into her bedroom with a smile and a lingering laugh on his lips. Joshua's smile was reserved, and his was flamboyant. She pegged him immediately as the type of boy who knew how to flirt to get exactly what he wanted.

She froze in her seat, heart pounding. It was the only thing moving about her. Wide-eyed and open-mouthed, she was as still as the dead in her seat, staring at him. The female vampire, the fire-haired imp, wasn't a threat. This one, this one that looked like Joshua's older brother, was.

Because he was older. Manny found that curious. The female vampire was barely out of high school, but the male vampire easily could be a third year student at the university.

The female vampire noticed how still she had gone, and stared at her inquisitively, helping herself to a seat at the end of Manny's bed. Though the bed was low, she was so short her feet barely touched the ground.

"So, you saw enough then that you know what Ash and I are." Her voice was pretty--a little on the husky side, but with a clarity that made it carry as easily as the sweetest bell. Manny turned her panic gaze to the red-head. "My name's Poppy Redfern. That's my cousin-in-law, Ash Redfern. I believe that your roommate told you why were here."

"She's an exciteable one, isn't she?" Ash drawled, gesturing with his head back to the hallway and to Tanya. He opted to stand, hands tucked into the pocket of dark blue denims and his shoulders hunched. Manny recognized the bad boy routine when she saw it. He flashed his teeth and locked stares with her. "I bet that if I bit into her I'd get nothing but sugar. She'd probably give me cavities."

Poppy laughed, a delightfully musical sound. "Stop scaring her, Ash. Just because she recognizes a vampire doesn't mean that you have to make her more frightened than she already is. Come on, you're the king at this."

Ash sighed. "You're right. You know, once upon a time I seem to recall you being as energetic as she."

She grinned and leaned over, punching him hard in the shoulder. The camaraderie surprised Manny. Joshua certainly had not seemed as friendly or _normal_ as these two, with their jokes and easy banter. "What's the matter, Ash? Are you sad that your cousin got to have the cavity before you did?"

"Poppy, not biting your pretty little human neck is something for which I pine for every day." He turned his gaze back to Manny, eyes somber now that he'd gotten out some of his flirtatiousness. "This would probably be easier if you told us exactly how much you know."

Joshua's warning came flooding back to her. For all that they were acting kind and normal towards her, she couldn't trust them. He'd warned her to be aware of tricks others of his kind would use to gain her trust, to find out what she knew.

Still, Manny wouldn't normally call coming right out and asking politely a trick.

"I don't know anything," she protested, turning back to her computer and shutting off the monitor so it wouldn't distract her. "I just saw a prank. That's all."

"Yeah, we heard that too." Ash, she was certain, would normilarly have a stunning voice. The kind that could make a girls knees weak if it was whispered into her ear. At the moment, though, it was curdled. "Dirty-blonde hair and eyes that change color, was the way Lacey described him too us. Sounds a little familiar to me. I see a face like that every time I look into the mirror."

"Joshua does look like you," she admitted.

Poppy's eyes crinkled at the sides from the force of her grin. "Oh ho! The mysterious killer has a first name! Joshua!"

Manny mentally mumbled curses to herself for having let his name slip.

"His name could be George Washington, for all I care." Ash pulled his hands from his pockets to fold his arms across his chest. "What I do care about is that if these rumors about a man looking like me continue to spread around campus, I'm going to get a bad rap. I don't particularly want people thinking that I'm a murderer, or into pulling pranks on helpless young women. You catch my drift?"

Manny felt herself relax. "You want me to stop telling people that I saw something, or at least what Joshua looks like. Can do. I already have Joshua and the police hounding after me. I might as well have Joshua's older twin and a perfect stranger telling me what to do too. I've already stopped, okay? If _you _hadnt come in here and brought the subject matter back up, then I would be working on my English paper right now!"

Much to her resentment, Ash's response was to laugh. "We've gotten her mad, Poppyanna!"

Poppy's green eyes flickered to him, and her voice was saccharine. "Ash, cuz, honey, if you call me that again, I'll pummel you so hard your darling Soulmate wont have anything but bruises to kiss for the next month.

"Look, Manny," Poppy continued, "I know you know what Ash and I are. I was in your shoes once too, sitting there, thinking that vampires couldn't possibly be real."

"Actually, when he told me I believed him right away. There was too much evidence that he wasn't human. I don't care if he told me he was a vampire, or a werewolf, or a freaking leprechaun, I would have believed it given the evidence."

She hadn't meant to speak. She was still angry, and she wanted to defend herself. She had blurted it out before she could remember Joshua's warning, and his threat that he'd be watching her. She bit the inside of her cheek to try and keep from saying anything else.

"Okay, so you know and you accept. That's really step one. Manny, there are dangerous things out there."

"I know. His name is Joshua."

Ash frowned. Even frowning, he was still the prettiest person that Manouchka had ever seen. He was prettier than Joshua, for certain. "There are worse things than a vampire out there, Sweetcheeks. There are things so damn scary that you'll crawl under your bed and cry for your mommy. There are things out there that'll break your bones and suck out the marrow. There are things bigger than them that'll use your bones to pick the meat from their teeth."

"Ash! Stop it! Youre scaring her!"

But Manny was shaking her head. "No. He already warned me. You're just trying to make me more scared of you than I am of him so that I'll listen to you. You're a bully, just like he is."

Poppy smiled, and then burst out laughing. "Wow! Less than ten minutes here and she's already got you pegged, Ash Redfern!" Ash didn't look very pleased. "He _is_ bullying you, but not so that you'll listen to us. We don't know this Joshua person, but we do know that he's not one of us, and that could be bad for your health, Manny. You see, what we come from, we refer to the Night World. It's the world around you that humans can't see... mainly because we dont want them too and because when they do catch glimpses of it, they ignore it."

"We're all the creatures of the night from the old movies," Ash continued, picking up where Poppy had left off like a finely tuned orchestra. "Vampires, werewolves, witches and shapeshifters. There may even be mummies and creatures from the black lagoons, but I've yet to meet either of them."

"There are different organizations within the Night World. They all have their different beliefs, and interpretations of the law."

Ashs grin was downright feral. "The group that Poppy and I represent tend to downright ignore the rules."

"The _rules_," Poppy continued quickly, before Manny could jump to conclusions, "are very simple. If a human finds out about the Night World, kill them. That's the rule we tend to ignore. Our group is tired of hiding in the shadows. We want people to know about us. We don't go showing ourselves off to them, because we know it makes people uncomfortable, but we _don't_ agree with killing people just because they find out we exist."

"The other rule we tend to break a lot, is the one about not falling in love. We tend to fall in love with humans."

Manny was being given a lot of information to be given all at once. It was stunning, but she was able to follow some of it. "Let me guess: don't fall in love with humans, because when you do, you tend to expose yourself and give away your secrets?"

Poppy tapped her freckled nose. "Bingo. Falling in love was how I learned about the Night World. I was dying of cancer and my Soulmate saved me by turning me into a vampire. We can't get cancer, you see. And Ash there, he was one of the bad boys, like your Joshua, until he fell in love with a human girl. Then he changed sides."

"So why are you two working together, then?"

Poppy seemed surprised and uncertain, like Manny was the first person to ask that question. Her eyes flickered back to Ash in the corner, as if asking permission or confirmation of something. He shook his head no to a question Manny didn't understand before moving to sit next to Poppy on the bed.

"There are things I've done in my life which are not pleasant. Namely, I did them to human girls like you. I took advantage of them, broke their hearts, and played pranks on them for not knowing about the Night World. My Soulmate, she's a sweet girl... a bit violent and maniacal, but sweet... and she wants me to prove to her that I really have changed. So that's why I work with Daybreak: to make the name of Ash Redfern into someone the Council fears, instead of some flirtatious party-goer they remember me as.

"But I'm afraid that I'm still a bit of a flirt. Finding your Soulmate... when you find them, suddenly you start looking around at the girls around you and realizing that you could never have a full life with them. They're not smart enough for you, not sweet enough for you, not brave enough for you, because you found the one that was perfectly meant for you, whose very being molds against your own so well that you forget sometimes that you're an individual."

She could hear the longing in his voice as he spoke about his Soulmate. If there was one person in the world for you and she'd turned you away, how much would you pine for her? But his pining wasn't obvious. There was heartache in his tone, but Manny suspected that Ash had taken the majority of that longing and turned it into burning passion to prove himself to his Soulmate.

"Poppy and I work together because, for one, I can flirt with her without having it be considered cheating or inappropriate. She's family, so the flirting gets demoted to playful banter and it gets it out of my system."

"Sometimes," Poppy giggled, "he sees someone so cute or pretty that he forgets he has Mary-Lynette. It's a bad habit that Ash is working hard to break. So when he sees someone that he'd normally take an interest in, like your roommate Tanya, he picks a fight with me until he forgets about it."

"My Soulmate is a one-man kind of woman, which makes me a one-woman kind of man. Just sometimes my eyes tend to forget that and they waver a little. Poppy helps keep me in check."

Manouchka looked between the two of them on the couch. Poppy was a vampire, but she was still small and dainty compared to Ash. She blinked. "How?"

Green eyes sparkling, Poppy replied: "I'm very loud."

Ash groaned and clutched his head, as if remembering the last time Poppy had needed to prove how loud she was before he flirted himself into a corner. His cousin giggled as a response and patted his back gently.

"The group we represent is called Circle Daybreak."

Manny frowned. "Circle? That makes it kind of sound like some kind of alcoholics anonymous thing."

"No argument," Ash laughed, "just don't let a witch hear you say that. That's where we get the Circle bit from. Therere are three different circles. Daybreak is the lightest, easiest-going group. The darker the name, the more devious their beliefs, get it? The other two are Twilight and Midnight."

"So Twilight would believe in the middle ground?" The vampires on her bed nodded and Manny continued. "And Midnight...?"

Poppy's eyes were as hard as jade, the exact same shade as Ash's. Apparently his eyes went green when he was angry. Manny was a little relieved to see it wasnt the strange purple of Joshua's angry expression. "Midnight," the male vampire nodded, "thinks of humans as their playthings. They're willing to cast spells on human beings that any other witch would frown upon: love spells, taking away free will, curses, hexes..."

His voice trailed off. Manny had gotten the idea.

"We want you to know, Manny, that we're here for you," Poppy began gently, wrapping up their rehearsed into-speech. Manouchka wondered how many people had heard this speech before...and how many had died shortly after hearing it. "Daybreak's here for you. If this Joshua person does plan on hurting you, using you, then we can help protect you."

Joshua. Protect. The words made his voice spring to her mind. He'd told her that his blood would protect her mind from other vampires. He was trying to protect her, in his own bullying way. Her eyes flickered to her small window, and for a moment she thought she saw sapphire-purple eyes, framed by blonde, but she blinked and there was nothing there.

She couldn't take the chance that he wasnt listening. She had to assume that he was. Her fists tightened against her lap. She knew it was illogical, she knew she had no real reason to believe him, but she felt that he really was trying to protect her. She had to believe him, and even as she thought of believing someone who admitted to being a murderer, she knew it was because of the blood bond they now shared.

She should believe Ash and Poppy. They told her that they knew Lacey, about their organization, but even as she thought that, proposing the counter-argument to the very fiber of her soul, she felt herself disagree with it.

Lacey could never be a part of this world. She couldn't be a vampire. Manny had known Lacey since they were in grade school. They had grown up together. Vampires didn't _grow up_. They were turned from humans.

"Joshua has already told me that he'd protect me," she said, and when she saw the two vampires exchange expressions, she wondered if she'd said something wrong. "So I don't think I need this Circle Daybreak. Thanks for the offer, though. You know where the door is. I think you should use it now."

Ash frowned. "Well now, that's a little bit rude..."

"You would know, wouldn't you, Mr. Redfern? Joshua warned me against tricks. He told me that people would come after me, try to find out what I know, and he told me that he'd be watching over me to keep me safe."

She paused, her throat too dry, when she realized what that sounded like. No wonder they had looked uneasy before she'd told them to leave! The second rule of their Night World was never to fall in love with a human and that was certainly what Manny was making it sound like. If these people were faking being from this Circle Daybreak, if such a place even existed, then they now had the perfect ammunition to take to Joshua and punish him for breaking the law.

'No use in telling them that now,' she decided. 'Protesting would only make you look guilty. Just play dumb and keep telling them to leave.'

"I think you should go before he comes in and checks on me and sees you here," she suggested.

Something in her tone made them comply. Poppy was the first to rise, setting a card down on the bed behind her. "We'll be in town a little while longer. If you need us, you can call us. Anytime, Manny. I mean that. Ash and I are very light sleepers."

"Yeah," he chuckled. "I keep thinking that one day Poppy'll kill me while I sleep."

* * *

...to be continued.

* * *

Chapter Five


	6. Chapter 6

**AN: **Clearly weekly updates didn't work, so here's two chapters at once.

**Chapter Six**

The second of November eventually rolled around without a word from Joshua, Lacey, or Ash and Poppy. Manny worked diligently on her English paper, her homework, housework, and tried very hard not to think about vampires, Joshua, or this thing called the Night World.

Coming out of her class on Tuesday morning, she stood blinking in the sunlight. Whoever had scheduled science classes for eight am Tuesday morning was a cruel individual. She stood at the bus stop, debating walking and enjoying the sunlight, sipping a coffee and trying to wake herself fully back up, despite having spent the last three hours in class.

Geology, the English student decided sullenly, was enough to make anyone fall back asleep again.

She saw Matt Aspen coming out of the student center and felt the warmth creep up her cheeks. He was looking far too awake for noon. She watched him walk. He walked as though the entire stretch of sidewalk up to the parking lot was a professional walk way. Manny wasn't the only girl who was watching him, she noted. _Matt Aspen could probably walk through a nunnery and have eyes follow him wherever he goes,_ she thought to herself.

What she wouldn't give to have him glance her way and notice her and smile! But he walked on by without a second glance at her. Manny sighed. Why was she fooling herself? He'd never noticed her. She was too normal. Someone as pretty and intelligent as Matt Aspen deserved a girl with supermodel looks--and no brains. Matt needed a trophy girlfriend, and Manny knew she'd never be happy being a trophy girlfriend.

She just wished he'd _notice_ her. Hell, to have _anyone_ notice her and think she was attractive.

But if it was Matt Aspen, the best of the best, that happened to find her attractive...

He approached behind her. She never heard him approach until his hand fell on her shoulder gently. She spun around, arms half-raised to defend herself. Then her mouth fell open. "Joshua!" Her look of surprise turned into one of disgust and she sneered up at him. "Isn't your kind supposed to burst into flame or ash when the sun's out?"

"A fallacy invented by humans so that they'd feel safer in the daylight."

A man wasn't allowed looking so good in just jeans and a sweater. She wondered why he wasn't wearing a jacket, but then reminded herself: he was the living dead. She doubted very much that the cold bothered him like it did her. Apparently, despite his comment about humans, the sun bothered him enough to be wearing sunglasses.

His eyes scanned her up and down and she felt her shoulders stiffening in protest. It would be one thing if he was looking her like a piece of meat, but it was another thing entirely to be examined from head to do and to see him sneer back at her. She felt ashamed of wearing navy lounge pants and an old, beaten orange turtleneck for class. Her voice was laced with poison.

"I'd have dressed better if I knew you'd surprise me at the bus stop," she snapped.

"Your closet is more outdated than mine. Come on. My car's in the parking lot."

"What? You were just sitting out here waiting for me?"

"Pretty much." He shrugged indifferently. "I hacked into the school computer and got your class schedule. Then I waited for you when I knew I could pick you up from school. As far as everyone around us thinks, I'm a friend giving you a ride home."

Manny pulled her jacket around her tighter. "Yes, well, I don't exactly _need_ a ride home. I have my bus pass, and I'm just at the bottom of the hill. So, _thank_ you very much for your offer, but I don't need it."

He pulled the sunglasses down in time for her to watch the colors turn from his neutral grey to violet-anger. His tone took on a powerful edge, making her wonder just how old he really was. Neither Ash nor Poppy had used their voice like a weapon, or had gazes so powerful that the whole world seemed darker because of it. Manny felt small and insignificant because of it, and even as she shrank away from him she registered the buzzing in his mind. He was using telepathy to put the edge on his words, not his actual voice.

"This wasn't an offer, Manny. Come with me. We need to talk."

"I prefer taking the bus." She put up a last-ditch effort. His eyes darkened.

_"Manny_."

She threw up her hands. "Okay! Fine! I surrender. Now then, stop using that old Jedi mind trick on me!" Manny marched off to his car, leading the way even though she barely knew what it looked like, while Joshua chuckled behind her.

* * *

Since he planned on establishing a blood bond with her, apparently he didn't feel the need to knock her out or blindfold her this time. Joshua lived close to the university, along the crest of the step hill on which the university was located. Manny understood the proximity to the school: the pubs on campus, the students walking home late at night, and the influx of new students every semester meant that there was a surplus of feeding opportunities.

For the first time, Manouchka got to see the house from the outside. Three stories tall, the house was made of brick. It was like some strange combination of castle and cottage: had it been one layer, it would have been perfectly crowned with a thatched roof, but at three floors, Manny thought it was missing a few turrets.

Surrounded by thick cedar hedges and tall coniferous trees, it was cloaked with shadow. A pumpkin forgotten from Halloween sat on the front porch. Manny thought that when she was a little girl, she would have needed to be paid money to trick-or-treat at this particular house.

Curiously, she noticed a Nissan in the garage. Joshua parked beside it. Compared to the red sports car, the Nissan was dowdy. Manny wondered if it belonged to Joshua, or if he lived with someone.

She remembered that he had food in his kitchen. Why would a vampire keep bread and peanut butter? He did live with someone; someone who needed food.

Joshua led her into the kitchen from the garage, and motioned for her to take a seat at the island again. She did so, and Joshua offered her a drink. Manny settled for orange juice again, and was surprised when he poured a glass for himself, sitting across from her at the island.

"Can you drink that?"

"I didn't pour it for show." His tone was quick, but Manny studied his eyes. They weren't angry, but bright blue--the color of the sky on a sunny summer day. He shrugged. 'I can drink it, but it doesn't do my body anything. I get my nutrients from blood. Still, there is something about the texture of the pulp. Having to drink only blood does get a little boring after awhile, and so I do snack on things just for a change. My favorite is the crunch of potato chips. There is something I find satisfying about crunchy foods, possibly because it is so different from blood."

"How often do you have to drink?"

"I like to feed every two days." He seemed to relax in his chair, drawn out by the conversation. "I need blood for the oxygen, mainly. My own blood doesn't carry it like yours, and so I need to replenish it. Without feeding, my body will start to suffocate: muscles will die off slowly, and eventually, in theory, the brain will die. I have heard tales that the restorative properties of vampire bodies are so strong that if a vampire were to expire from lack of feeding that forcing human blood into them will eventually revive them, but I'm not particularly keen to try that."

_Restorative properties,_ she thought. _Like Poppy and her cancer. Just how badly damaged would a human body have to be for the blood to not heal it?_

"Anyway, I asked you here today because I have some bad news. I was able to find a witch, but they can't perform the spell until December."

"December?! Why?"

"What I was asking her to do was a very strong spell," Joshua explained. "It needs a day of great power to cast it properly. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get in touch with them quickly enough for Samhain, which is the holiday that matches the human ceremony of Halloween. Because of it, I have to wait for the winter equinox, around December the twenty-first."

Manny had the sudden daydream of bringing him home for Christmas holidays. She wouldn't be in North Bay for the twenty-first. She would be home with her family for the holidays. There was no way she was going to give up seeing her family for a witch ceremony!

He saw the disgust on her face. "That was my thought exactly. So, given how long it would take for the witches to help, then I'm going with option number two. We need to do another blood exchange."

She jerked in surprise and the orange juice slipped from her hands. Manny waited for the sound of shattering glass and the pungent scent of citrus, but it never came. Her brain felt foggy as she realized that Joshua had seen the cup beginning to fall from her grip and had reached across the table to catch it before it could break.

"Thanks." Manny would have been embarrassed if she'd broken one of his cups. She watched as Joshua set the glass back on the island. "Do we have to do it immediately?"

Two days ago she would have been a little wary of the idea, but faced with the prospect now, the idea churned her stomach. She didn't like the idea of Joshua being that close to her, of his teeth sinking into her neck. It would probably hurt. A lot. And then she'd have to drink _his_ blood. Who knew what his blood carried! Her throat felt sour at the very idea.

"It does. You see, we need to do it before the blood you took before is out of your system. It's the constant supply of blood between us which will create the bond. If we wait longer, then we're just going to have to exchange blood more often."

"But when the link is established, we're done right? We never have to do it again. Right?"

He frowned. "Actually, then we'd only need to feed once a month in order to keep the connection strong."

"Establish the connection, keep the connection strong... why don't you just come out and say what you really mean: keep me loyal." He inclined his head, accepting what she said. At least she had no delusions regarding his motivations. "I... I'm not really as comfortable with this as I was before," she admitted nervously.

Joshua was already moving from the other side of the island. "You don't have to be scared. I don't really like the taste of fear, though I know several others of my kind enjoy it. I hear that willingly having your blood drunk is a rather enjoyable process, otherwise people wouldn't be willing to donate to us."

"I don't particularly care how pleasurable it's supposed to be," Manny snapped, backing away from the island. She looked around and spotted a doorway into the living room, and aimed for that. "I don't really want you that close to me, and I _certainly_ don't want to drink your blood!"

Manny wondered why he wasn't just grabbing her as quickly as he had grabbed the glass of orange juice. His eyes darkened a little. Despite the fact that he was bullying her again, and slowly becoming frustrated with her skittishness, he was trying to be gentle with her. That was why he was speaking to her gently, like she was a wild animal he was trying to bring closer.

"You were okay with it last time I talked to you."

"Because you were _threatening_ me!"

By now his eyes were completely angry. "If threatening you worked last time, then by God I'll do it again."

She never saw him move. He was standing in the kitchen, and then suddenly he was beside her. She was able to feel a small pinch in her mind. Joshua was fast, but he wasn't as fast as he appeared to be. He was using telepathy to augment his speed so that what would have been a blur of speed turned into teleportation.

His arms wrapped around her, and even though the cold didn't seem to bother him, she was surprised to find that his body was warm through his sweater. She stiffened in surprise, bringing her hands up to defend herself. As her hands pressed into his chest, futilely trying to keep him from pulling her against him, she felt a strong heartbeat beneath her palm.

"Something needs to pump the oxygen through my body," he said, noting her surprise. "My heart still beats, my breath will still fog in cold weather, and I still produce a certain amount of body heat--enough to pass for human."

She made the mistake of looking up at him. His fangs were down: slender white fangs that rested against his bottom lip. They weren't as scary as she had imagined, but they were still very sharp. They reminded her of snake fangs: delicate, but frightening, too.

But the blush that rose to her cheeks consumed her fear of him. She felt her knees beginning to go weak. Joshua was a handsome human, but when he was about to feed, he was haunting. His eyes, still impossibly sapphire-purple, were so deep she could almost forget about everything else. The idea of him being close enough to nuzzle her neck was no longer as disgusting as it had been a moment before.

_Relax._ The voice was gentle in her head. There was no pain in her mind from it this time. She wondered why. Could it be because she wasn't fighting against it? That she really did want to relax?

His arms tightened and she was pressed against him completely. His heartbeat was still steady under her palm, while hers was beating wildly. Breathing was becoming laborious.

_Tilt back your head_.

Again there was little pain in her mind from it. He was angry, but still being gentle with her. He must have known that she was afraid: her heartbeat, the way her palms were becoming clammy, how it was hard to breathe, were all signs of her fear. Realizing that he was trying hard to be kind to her touched her. Maybe he wasn't as much of a complete bully as she thought he was.

But she couldn't do that! She didn't _really_ want him to bite her--it was just an illusion. It was just another trick, like their beauty and their grace. She began to resist, and felt the pain deepen. She managed to fight through it.

"No!"

He repeated it again, this time with more force. She actually whimpered a moment in pain, but the assault was relentless. Gentle as he had been before, he wasn't going to give up simply because he was causing her a little bit of discomfort. He had his goal in mind, and apparently he wasn't willing to sacrifice his goal just because she wasn't willing.

"I mean it! No!" He leaned in closer. She could see his mouth opening from the corner of her eye. Manny began fighting back harder, trying to shove him away. Her feet struggled to gain a foothold on the ground, or to kick him, but he avoided her and held her off balance. With nothing else to do, Manouchka settled for what people had always told her to do. She inhaled deeply, and then screamed rape at the loud of her lungs.

He jerked back, arms dropping away from her. Had she hurt him? His hands pressed against his ears and he was actually wincing. She bolted to the other side of the couch in the living room, trying rather ineffectually to put distance between them.

He lifted his head, glaring at her, and cursed. "Did you seriously need to do that? I told you that it wouldn't hurt!"

"I don't care! I told you no!"

"And so you felt that you needed to scream rape in my bloody ear!? I'm a _vampire_, remember? I have better than human senses. You could have stopped me without screaming in my ear like that. I think I'm deafened now."

Manny was breathing heavily, and she knew that it was no longer solely because of fear. It was out of fatigue. Screaming at him, fighting against the force hed been exerting upon her mind, had taken a lot of energy. If he started commanding her mentally again, she didn't think she would be able to resist. Luckily, he was breathing just as heavily as she was, so she doubted very much that he'd be using telepathy on her any time soon.

The fact that she'd resisted him while he was using telepathy made her feel good. She wasn't as helpless against him as she had first thought! If he tried to bully her, she could at least fight she intended to do so! She wasn't about to let him push her around anymore!

Joshua straightened and caught her gaze. He was furious with her. His whole head ached from the force of her scream. While, over the years, he had fed on human beings who were far from willing, none of them had been so resistant to him that they'd screamed rape in his ear. Her voice had _hurt_, too!

"I _am _going to exchange blood with you," he snarled.

She panted, but grinned. "Bite... go to hell."

Joshua smiled. It seemed the proper reaction. Her near slip-up was cute. His shoulders relaxed. He didn't know how she'd been able to resist his telepathy like that, but at least she'd already proved that she couldn't resist natural commands made to her body. He couldn't convince her to move her neck, but...

_Sleep_.

* * *

Manny's first thought was that she had to resist the telepathy.

Then she realized that she was laying in Joshua's bed again. She was waking up--she'd already been asleep. She never even had the chance to resist the command. Manny cursed and sat up in bed, throwing off the covers. She regretted it when she felt suddenly very woozy.

Of course I feel woozy--he's drunk my blood again. The thought was immediately followed: and then he would have made me drink his blood.

She wanted a toothbrush. Her tongue ran over the roof of her mouth and her teeth, wondering if the bad taste in her mouth was because of him. She _yearned_ for her toothbrush.

And yet despite her fatigue, she didn't actually feel tired. She was weak, but refreshed.

The bedroom door opened and she prepared for Joshua to enter. She was shocked when instead she recognized the woman who walked in.

"Professor McGugan!"

Heather McGugan smiled at her. Her hair was down from her traditional bun, but her glasses were still perched on the end of her nose. Dressed in simple khakis and a sweatshirt, she was barely recognizable. When she recognized Manny in the bed, her smile suddenly vanished.

"You? You're the one that saw Joshua kill Ansel?" Manny thought it was disappointment in her voice she heard, but instead she shook her head sadly, and her blue eyes turned kind. "Oh, Manny. You have a nose for trouble, girl. Come on, and get out of bed. A spot of sugar should fix you up just fine. You've lost a fair bit of blood, you know. I'll bring you up a smoothie. Do you like mangoes?"

She nodded. "Good. I'll whip you up a smoothie and bring it upstairs for you. Then we can sit down and talk. I'm sure you have a lot of questions."

"Just a few."

Manny waited patiently. She could hear the blender going in the kitchen downstairs, and, having nothing to do, she settled back into the blankets, pulling them up around her neck. His comforter was thick and warm. Even if she hated Joshua at the moment--hated him _again_, she chuckled to herself--she had to admit that he had wonderful taste in blankets.

Then she shuddered away from them. She'd woken up in his bed twice. How many other girls had woken up in his bed since he'd last bought this comforter? Manny slipped out from between the sheets to sit on the bed instead. It still wasn't entirely hygienic, but it made her feel better.

Heather was back in no time, bringing with her a plate of fruits and a large smoothie. She gave the glass to Manny, motioning for her drink, and set the plate of food on the bed, before climbing on the bed to sit cross-legged. Her professor, Manny decided, was the only adult she'd ever seen sit on a bed cross-legged.

"I'm sure you have a lot of questions. Drink it slowly, hon. Which question should I answer first?"

Manny almost choked on her smoothie. She had so many questions, she didn't know which one to pick. She managed to clear her throat. "Why don't you pick for me?"

"Okay. Yes, I live here with Joshua. I suppose it would really be best to begin with the beginning. I was born in a small town in Scotland. I grew up in Scotland, too, but we moved to a larger town when I was a little girl. Only shortly after moving there, my parents were killed in a car crash. I was with them at the time."

Her voice was steady, but her face was distant. Her eyes were looking at Manouchka, but couldn't see her anymore. She might act like everything was fine, that she didn't miss her parents, but the wounds over their death hadn't healed yet. Manny could tell.

"My body was jettisoned from the car. I lay bleeding on the sidewalk, while the car burned, taking my parents with it. I was bleeding out. That's what attracted Joshua, you know, the smell of my blood. I was so young that he couldn't bring himself to feed of me, or kill me, so he saved me instead. He gave me his blood, right there on the deserted streets of my new hometown, and he saved me.

"It made the blood bond, you know, the same relationship he seeks to establish from you. At the time, though, all I knew was that I loved him like I loved my father. He raised me in my childhood. When I became an adolescent and old enough to notice that he hadn't aged since the day I met him, he told me what he was. At first I was scared, but this was the man who had raised me for the past decade.

"We began exchanging blood. It didn't take much to establish a connection with him, because I already loved him. I thought the world revolved around Joshua, and that was only simple childhood adoration. But he didn't change me. He never offered, and I think he knew that I was happy being human. He was happy seeing me grow up.

"Eventually, we had to move, before people began to notice that he wasn't growing up, while I was aging. We decided to move here, and for the past three years, I've been teaching here at Nipissing. Our relationship works out well. My job pays for the house and my food. I provide him a bit of food once a month. In return, he does all of my editing and research for the papers that allow me to keep my job."

At last Manny found some information that she could process. "So if he does the research for you and edits your papers for you, then does that mean that you don't really write your own papers?"

She gave her a withering look. Manny winced. She'd gotten herself into trouble again. "He collects information for me, and I combine all that information with my own ideas. I write my own papers. He simply edits them for me. Joshua is a very good editor, though sometimes he is a little brutal."

"So you're not, like, married or...?"

"Lovers?" Heather smiled wryly, and her eyes shone with delight, taking pride in how obviously uncomfortable the idea of her professor and Joshua being romantically involved made Manny. "Hardly. He's my protector, pure and simple: my father when I was young, my brother when I was a teenager, and now my coworker and my friend. Joshua... Joshua doesn't really _like_ anybody like that. He never has. He's too old for it."

Manny leaned forward a little, curious with this side of him Heather was exposing. If she were as good looking as Joshua, she would have been more than happy to flirt with and seek relationships with others. She couldn't ever imagine becoming _bored_ with being with someone romantically. Didn't he miss it? Didn't he miss having someone to hug, or kiss, or snuggle with? "How old is he, exactly?"

"I don't actually know. He's never told me. He likes his secrets." She winked at her. "Joshua thinks it gives him an air of mystery."

"He told me what you saw in the woods, and how you've agreed to enter into a pact with him. Then, I was in my study working on my research paper when I heard you scream because he took you up on your agreement. He didn't ask me to talk to you, but I thought it would be best to do so, to tell you that there's someone here whose been through the same thing you are. I didn't expect it to be one of my students, though."

She shrugged and found herself smiling. "I didn't expect to find out that one of my English professors is living with a cute vampire."

"Ah, so you think he's cute?" She wiggled her eyebrows comically and chuckled when Manouchka blushed. "Ah, don't worry, Manny. I know that my Joshuas a handsome lad. I only thought to tease ye a little."

Her accent came through more strongly for a moment. Was she letting it through because she was actually relaxing around her? Were they bonding? This certainly felt like there was a conversation she could be having with Lacey.

"It bothered him, you know, that you screamed such in his ear." Manny turned her face away so her professor couldn't see the guilt. "He really is a sweet boy, not the bully that you seem to think that he is. I was scared my first time, too. It's only natural to be frightened: he's a predator, and you're his prey. But I can guarantee you that Joshua's very gentle, Manny. He won't purposely hurt you. He can keep knocking you out to do this, you know, or you can just..."

She sighed, almost giving up trying to explain her thoughts. It sounded too much like the stereotypical bird and the bee conversation between a mother and a daughter. Despite being old enough to be Manny's mother, she wasn't, and the conversation was beginning to border on impropriety. Luckily, Manny saved her.

"I can just be brave and actually do it?" Heather nodded gratefully. "No. I don't like the idea of his mind influencing my body to go to sleep again, but I won't stay awake to drink his blood. The idea of it churns my stomach enough when I wake up and realize that it's been done. I don't want to be awake when it happens. And it seems way too intimate. I'll admit that Joshua's cute, but there's no way that I want to be that close to him."

Nodding, Heather said that she understood. "I would suggest keeping an open mind, Manny. It is quite pleasurable, and once the bond is established, then you won't have to drink his blood. He will, as you no doubt know, have to continue drinking yours on a somewhat regular basis." Her smile was a little wistful, and Manny wondered if she knew how she rubbed her neck as she spoke. "You're my replacement."

Manny wondered if she'd heard correctly. "I'm your what?"

"My replacement. I'm old Manny--not a senior, but certainly old enough that within the next ten years, my body won't be able to keep up with blood production, or my heart be able to keep up with the extra pumping needed after feeding. You're going to bond with him. No matter how much his visits may sometimes annoy you, or the way he remains young disturb you, you will find that you will still care for him no matter what. One day, you might very well find yourself living with him, or at least close to him, and that sometime along the journey, he really _did_ become your friend."

"You mean I'm going to be a..."

"I dont know," she interrupted quickly, "what word you were going to use in that sentence, but we like to think of a symbiotic relationship."

From what Heather had explained to her, Manny didn't exactly see what Joshua's role was to make their relationship symbiotic, and she said as much to her professor. "With the exception of maybe some housework and researching your papers, what else does he do? You pay the bills, you feed yourself, you feed him..."

"How old do I look to you, Manny?"

Manouchka frowned and tried to tread carefully. "I don't know... thirty-five?" Her professor gave her a reproachful look, knowing she was lying to try and be nice. "Okay, fine. You look like you're in your late fifties my Mom's age, maybe. She's only fifty-four."

"I'm sixty-seven, Manny." Manny's eyes bulged. With her hair still mostly raven-black, only flecked with silver streaks, and the only wrinkles visible her laugh lines and crows feet, there was no way that Manny ever would have suspected Heather's real age. "The blood keeps me well-preserved; very well-preserved. Joshua's lack of aging wasn't the only reason why we needed to move. Furthermore, I have never been sick in my life. Because of his blood, I will never get the flu, or a cold, although I do suffer from seasickness, and his blood can't stop that. Thanks to his blood, another vampire can never influence my mind. That's what I get for giving him my blood; those are the physical benefits.

"The Night World," she continued, scarcely missing a beat, "is a dangerous place. A human can easily become lost in it. By revealing his secret to me, he actually broke their rules. Because I know about the Night World, if other vampires of werewolves found out, they'd try to kill me, and then they'd kill Joshua."

Manny felt a pang of fear; not just for Joshua, but for herself and Professor McGugan, for all those who had accidentally stumbled into the Night World. She had deduced from Joshua, Poppy, and Ash that the penalty for a human finding out about the Night World was death, but she hadn't suspected death for Joshua as well.

"But if the penalty is death, why risk it? Obviously, with you he saved you. He's a bully, but I dont think he's heartless enough to kill a little girl he saved and then raised from childhood. With me, he didn't have to try to save me. So why does he put himself in danger?"

"Because he thinks that it's the right thing to do," she replied. "He's lived a long time and tried a lot of different ways of living. Joshua thinks that this was the way vampires were meant to exist. He has one or two regular girls who know who and what he is. They'll never expect anything from him, or want anything else, either. Between them and a few hunts, he can sustain himself without taking anyone's life. Prior to living this way, he had to integrate himself into society and have a girlfriend a month. He'd hook up with someone, and then after a month he'd dump her before the blood bond became too strong.

"He realized one day that he was hurting them, and he didn't like it. He'd also grown tired of having to keep himself integrated within society to find himself a girlfriend. Having me of the face of his house allows him to become, essentially, a hermit, which is what he's wanted for the past few decades. How would you like to be stuck at the age of eighteen?"

Manny rubbed her chin thoughtfully, and honestly thought that it couldn't be that bad, as far as being a vampire went. "I'd be young and healthy until I died, and if I were a vampire well, I haven't seen an ugly one yet, so I'd be pretty, too, I suppose. It can't be that bad to be stuck in the prime of your life, right?"

"Ah, but youre not thinking of the social impacts: you'd have to remain either in high school or your first few years of post secondary. You could never get a degree, or a job long enough to be high up in the command department because you don't age; unless that business belonged to the Night World. You'd only just be able to drive, and if you were to journey some place like the United States, you wouldn't be able to drink. You'd only _just_ be able to vote, to make a decision in who runs the very government of your nation. You would be trapped on the cusp of adulthood and childhood--_forever_."

She didn't like the idea, personally, of having to repeat high school indefinitely. Manouchka frowned. "I think I'm beginning to see your point."

Heather smiled at her kindly. She gave Manny's leg another gentle pat and then stood up off the bed. "Good. Now then, finish the rest of your smoothie and I'll give you a lift to the bottom of the hill."

Manny tilted her head to the side, surprised. Joshua had always driven her home before. "Why not Joshua?"

She'd never thought the question might offend her professor, and it didn't, but she did appear hurt by it. Her smile turned upside down and she shook her head sadly. "He's hiding in his office. You hurt his feelings by not trusting him, I think. He's not the bad guy that you seem to think he is, Manny."

"He..."

"I know. You saw him kill someone. I'm sure that given his age, there's more than just Ansel he's killed. Still, can't you think of some cases where murder is acceptable compared to the alternative?"

She looked away, ashamed. Of course she could think of some cases where it would be okay... well, she corrected, not okay, but at least acceptable. If she were in danger, then she'd prefer taking someone else's life than letting someone kill her. Heather knew what she was thinking and nodded.

"Maybe should I go talk to him?" Then she regretted the offer. What would she even say?

Heather placed a gentle hand on her shoulder with an understanding smile. "A simple 'I'm sorry' always works best, I find. He might hide his feelings deep, but you did still hurt him by not being willing to trust him, at least a little. You can feel how the bond is already causing you to warm up to him, arent you? He feels the same thing, you know. He was in the wrong for trying to force you, and I think that you did good, yelling at him like that. He shouldn't have tried to force you if you weren't ready, but but do try to trust him a little, Manny. His heart _is_ in the right place. Of course, if you don't know what to say, then believe me that this will pass over quickly. You won't..."

"No. I _should_ say something to him!"

Smoothie in hand, Manny followed Heather to Joshuas office. She knocked gently on the door, and heard him tell her to enter. Joshua spun around in the office chair, away from the computer to look at her. His eyes looked guilty when he saw it was her.

She felt a pang in her chest when she saw him: straight blonde hair, his narrow nose, and the simple, normal grey hue of his eyes. It was a sweet pang, and one that threatened to draw her closer to him. It felt vaguely like what she felt when she saw Matt Aspen. But when he saw her and returned the expression, his pinched mouth loosening and lips parting nervously, she knew that this time, he felt it too. Whatever she was feeling for him, it wasn't unrequited, and she recalled Heathers words. The blood bond worked both ways; he'd be tied to her as well.

"I'm sorry," he said, breaking the silence first.

Manouchka smirked. "No, you really aren't. You did what you thought was necessary. But it's nice to know that you're human enough to tell me what it is you think I need to hear."

* * *

Next chapter!


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

Lacey was home when Manny arrived back at residence. She came bursting out of her room--not like Tanya, Manny noted, but like a burst of fire. She was only half-dressed in pajama bottoms and a bra, her hair scattered every which way and one large hoop earring still in her ear.

"In the middle of getting ready for bed?"

"Oh, don't distract me with questions! You were out with a boy! I want details! I'm using the best friend forever card and demanding that you give me all the hot details! I already know what happened that first time from Beth and Tanya. I want to know what happened with him tonight!"

Manny shook her head and put down her book bag in the kitchen. The aroma of Lacey's tea wafted around the kitchen and Manny helped herself to it, using her favorite mug. It had a picture of Poppa Smurf on it and a funny saying which had since rubbed off, but the little blue man remained. "There's not much to tell. He abducted me after classes and offered to drive me home. It just turned out that he meant his home."

"And then he drops you off here after midnight!"

She nodded, not bothering to tell her that it had been Professor McGugan and her Nissan, not Joshua of the red sports car, who had dropped her off home. "Lace, where's Beth and Tanya?"

"In bed. Why?"

Manny hesistated over sugar for her tea and decided not to add it. She was still on a bit of an adrenaline rush from being with Joshua, his blood leaving behind a residual feeling of calm energy that beat the pants off any amount of sugar. "Do you know people named Poppy and Ash Redfern?"

"Honey, I knew Poppy back when she was still Poppy Snow." Then Lacey clued in. "Oh! Good! They made it! Did you like them?"

Manouchka felt floored. The hand holding the tea gave a slight tremor. She forced herself to put it back down before she broke her favorite mug. "Lacey do you belong to this Night World?"

Lacey blinked, and then she looked crestfallen. "Oh, Manny..." Manny didn't try to move away as Lacey embraced her. In her arms, she knew that she'd be safe. "Oh, babe, I didn't know it had gone that far. If it had, then I would have cancelled my plans and stayed here to be with you, to make it easier for you. They didn't scare you too much, did they? Ash can be cruel, and sometimes Poppy can be a little overly dramatic."

"No," she replied thoughtfully, after having given it a moment or two of thought. Compared to how Joshua had initially frightened her, Poppy and Ash had been rather tame. "But when they were talking, I was trying to figure out how you fit into everything, and why you hadn't told me about it yourself."

Her friend's impish face was pained. She took one of Manny's hands in both of hers. "Come on into my bedroom. Why don't we talk in there in case we wake our other roommates up? They don't need to be drawn into this too."

"Then Beth and Tanya, they're not..."

"Night Worlders? Well, Tanya's perfectly human. Beth, on the other hand, is a werewolf."

"But... But I've seen her on full moons. She doesn't change or go on a..."

"Killing spree?" Lacey laughed. "That bit is just human lore. All a werewolf really refers to is someone who is part human and part wolf. She can change her shape at will, and be one or the other."

Lacey motioned for Manny to sit on the bed, and she helped herself to the chair at her desk. After throwing on a sweatshirt she began taking out the other earring and told Manny to tell her everything Ash and Poppy had explained to her about the Night World. Sometimes she winced, thinking of better ways in which things could have been explained, but mostly she just nodded. When Manny finished, she was still nodding.

"And so you really do know why I couldn't tell you, don't you?" she asked, but Manny was stubborn.

"No. I don't see! I mean, even if you couldn't tell me about the Night World, I don't really care what religion you are. You could have at least told me you were a witch, or Wiccan or Pagan or whatever you call it. You could have introduced me to your other friends and not have told me that they're vampires and stuff. If you really are one of these Daystrikers..."

_"Daybreakers_," Lacey corrected.

"Whatever. Then you could have at least told me some of it, because they let you break the rules a little right? Poppy and Ash broke them to me."

Her eyes flashed dangerously, wild red hair making her eyes almost glowing in contrast to the burgundy color. "Poppy and Ash can break the rules because they're high up in the community. I'm not. If the Prime Minister and Joe Blow broke the law, which one do you think the government would put more money and effort into saving?

"Besides, Manny, if I told you, then I'd be putting you in danger. You're my _friend_. If I told you what I really was and the world I really come from, and then you found out that because I told you, you could be killed for talking to the wrong person, do you think I could have kept you as a friend? Because I didn't think I could."

She looked at her friend seriously, and the eye contact made Manny feel nervous. Unlike Joshua's eyes, there was no pull in her gaze. It was refreshingly normal, like talking to Professsor McGugan. "You're my friend because of who I am. Where I come from doesn't change that. I don't sacrifice babies or cute fuzzy animals. I like pizza and movies on a date. I'm still the same person I was before you found out about the Night World."

"Why now? Why have Poppy and Ash tell me about the Night World now? Did you know that Joshua was a vampire when you prodded me into dancing with him at the bar?"

Laceys eyes lit up. "He's a vampire? Oh, way to go girl! Vampires are oh-so sexy!"

Manouchka was honestly beginning to wonder what it was with people and thinking that vampires were a big catch. She still thought they were scary, and didn't see the big attraction to them. Sure, they were all beautiful thus far, but Manny would trade a beautiful vampire for a normal, non-blood-drinking human boy any day. Then she thought of the pang she felt when she last saw Joshua, the way her heart had thumped unexpectedly, and found herself reconsidering. She was _fairly_ certain that if she had the choice between a vampire and a human boy she'd pick the latter. The attraction of not worrying about waking up with bite wounds was a definite plus.

"But did you know?"

"No! I just thought he was cute, and I know how flattering it is when a man looks at you the way he was looking at you." She straightened a little in her seat, making Manny sigh. Short, elfish, and red-haired, Lacey had drawn several eyes her way in her life. "I just thought it'd be a confident boost to dance with a hot guy like that. Vampires and shapeshifters, the latter especially, are very good at being able to tell if someones a human or something else. Witches can tell, but not without spells. I actually called Ash and Poppy in because well, because of the murder you saw.

"I told you, didn't I? Id believe you, no matter how extraordinary the story became, because I know that there's a lot out there that humans can't explain, but I can. Although, I do admit that if you had involved aliens in your story, I probably would have doubted you a little. When I heard your story, I thought that it sounded like there might be a Night World involvement, so I called Daybreak to have someone check it out. Poppy and Ash were the closest, so they were asked to come here and make sure that everything would be okay."

Manny squirmed uncomfortably. "Well," she drawled, "your instincts were right. He was a vampire. The man he killed was apparently a vampire, too."

"He was? How do you know? Did Poppy and Ash find the killer already?"

She shook her head. "Joshua's the killer."

Lacey was shocked into silence. Once her mind processed it, her voice turned shrill. "What?! The same Joshua you were just out half the night with? That Joshua?! _He's_ the killer?!"

"Lacey! Shh! You were the one who didn't want to wake up Tanya and Beth!"

"I know, but good grief, Manny! He killed someone and then he started harassing you, and now what? You're dating him?"

Manny's face burnt with the force of her blush, nearly invisible against her creamy, dark skin, but she felt it nonetheless. "Lacey, it's not like that. I don't even like him! I've been spending so much time with him because he wants to do bond me to him so that I can't tell anyone about what I saw."

Her face paled. "Oh Goddess I never even made the connection. Tall, right?"

"Compared to you, yeah," she teased.

"Blonde, fairly deeply tanned for a blonde, and a vampire and grey eyes?" Manny nodded. "Drives a red sports car? Oh, Manny! He came to _me_ and asked _me_ to do the bonding ceremony! I never even made the connection! I didn't get a good look at his face on Halloween, and I was looking out for a man with violet eyes, not oh, it's perfectly inexcusable. Manny, I told him I'd _do _it!"

Manny laughed--she laughed so hard that tears ended up gathering in her dark eyes, making them glisten and shine. "Lace, man, I'd _die_ of happiness if you could do the ceremony to tie us together right now! Instead, he told me that to do a witche's ceremony, we'd have to wait until nearly Christmas! So instead he's entering into a blood bond with me."

Lacey's face glowered dangerously. For half a second, Manouchka could almost see faint wisps of smoke clinging to the ends of Lacey's dark red hair. Then Lacey turned her face and Manny couldn't see it again. She must have been imagining it. There was no way that Lacey could be so mad she'd actually start to _smoke_ right?

"You're entering into a what with him?"

"Blood pact. Did I get the phrase wrong?"

"No, no. You got the phrased right, Arsenic. I just want to know how a smart girl like you... I mean..." Unable to put her thoughts into words without insulting Manny, Lacey leapt up from her chair to pace around her bedroom, her small hands clutched into tight balls. Her voice was a sibilant hiss when she spoke, in a determined effort to keep from yelling and wake up the other girls.

"People try to _avoid_ entering onto pacts like those with vampires! They do it for a reason! It's because it's dangerous! If the vampire in question is strong in telepathy, then it's a complete and total surrender of your free will. Look, has he used telepathy on you at all?"

She nodded her head and clutched her Smurf mug closer for the warmth offered by the tea. "I hate it."

"Well, if he completes this blood bond with you, then he won't have to use telepathy on you. He'll just tell you to do whatever he wants, and you will. You won't even be able to resist it. You'll be like a mindless slave."

Manny thought of Heather McGugan. She seemed to be in control of herself still. She shook her head. She couldn't believe that. But then she thought of Joshua, and the thump in her heart when she had seen him sitting in his office

"You've already felt it, haven't you? Manny, how else did you think that he was going to get you to keep his secret? He's just going to tell you not to--and you'll willingly comply because of some strange compulsion-infatuation mix. The question really is, why would he do that?"

"What do you mean?"

Lacey gestured to her. "You just told me that he used telepathy on you, so clearly he has that talent. If he's strong enough that he thinks he can make a blood bond with you and make you keep your word, then I would have thought he'd be strong enough to use telepathy and just make you forget?"

"You mean just having him make me forget could have been an option, too?" Manny huffed up in anger and sulked as she sat on the bed. "That choice sounds like the best one so far. So why didn't he do it?"

She smiled wryly. "That's what I just asked you, you silly gooseling. What has he asked you to do telepathically?"

"Oh sleep, mostly. Sometimes he'd get me to come closer or be quiet if I were going to scream. He... he tried to bite me while I was awake last night and got me to tilt back my neck for him. I don't like it when he uses telepathy because it hurts." She rubbed her temple, just thinking about the way her head ached whenever Joshua used telepathy around her. "It's like a pinching in my brain."

"Telepathy that hurts is new to me."

"So then you don't know why it hurts?"

"Could be that he's just very old. The more human blood you consume, or have consumed, the stronger a vampire is. If he's had a couple hundred years to drink human blood, he could be so strong enough that telepathy is overwhelming for an unprotected mind. But then, if he's that strong, he would have been able to not just wipe your mind of a few simple memories, but knock you out before you even had a chance to run back to residence. Unless..."

Manny leaned forward, unable to follow Lacey's mental leaps. "Unless want?"

"Unless you happen to have a natural resistance to telepathy."

She blinked. "That can happen?"

"Of course. Some people are just born with the ability to resist telepathy. I like to think that it's natural selection. If the vampires always go after the people who respond to telepathy, and they happen to die, then they're slowly removing those genes from the gene pool, leaving behind only people who can resist their telepathy."

"That sounds so simple... Ugh, I don't even know what telepathy even is, and already I'm sick of it."

Lacey took her seat back. "So what are you going to do? Are you going to go through with this blood bond thing, or wait until a ceremony that'll just keep you from talking about it?"

"No. I'm sorry, Lace, but I can't stand the idea of waiting until Christmas. There's no way that you can do the ceremony sooner?" Lacey shook her head no. "I didn't think so. The thing is, he's almost paranoid about me spilling the beans. If I wait, then he'll just keep coming over and kidnapping me to bite me so that until the ceremony happens he won't have to worry about me telling anybody what happened. The less biting involved, the happier I'll be."

"Even if it means the loss of your free will?"

She recalled Professor McGugan again, and frowned. "I think I'll only lose my free will if he asks me to. Joshua's... I don't think he's really the type to actually exercise that influence over me, unless he has a good reason to."

"And what good reason does he have for pushing you around and killing somebody?" Lacey demanded bitterly.

Manny thought a moment before answering. "Protecting someone he loves."

* * *

She woke up the following day feeling tired. Apparently the energy she'd received from Joshua's blood didn't last as long as she had suspected, but then she had stayed up until three am talking with Lacey. Between having her blood drunk the night before and then only four hours of sleep, Manny felt grumpy.

They had been up so late because Lacey had been explaining more of the Night World to Manouchka, seeing how she had already been thrust into it. For the first time since they had met in grade school, Manny knew all about her friends religious practices, and had even been promised to come and watch the Equinox party.

They had also been talking about Joshua. Lacey still thought that what Manny was doing was a bad idea, but Manny was just tired of being bullied around by him. She wanted it to be over. The sooner she could begin seeing him only once a month, the better, she thought.

But Lacey had convinced her to talk once again to Ash and Poppy. She grew even more concerned when Manny refused to have them in the apartment again. With Lacey's involvement in the Daybreak organization, she was willing to trust them a little more, but as far as she knew, Joshua was still going to be keeping an eye on her. She didn't need to get into another argument with him because he saw her with Ash and Poppy.

Beth offered to drive her to the dinner where they'd be meeting for lunch. Manny accepted, and when she they got into the car, Beth had only just pulled out of the parking lot when she began teasing her.

"So, I hear youre meeting with some of the big guns?" She nodded. "So this killer you saw was one of us, huh? You know, that could explain why there was no body or blood at the crime scene."

"It does? I'd just assumed that with his superhuman speed and stuff, that somehow Joshua had been able to cover it up."

"More than likely, but the possibility remains that he might not have had to." Beth shook her dark hair and leaned back in her seat, one hand on the steering wheel, the other hand on her raised knee as she drove. "You see, there are two types of vampires, Manny. There're vampires that have been made--you know, turned, just like in the movies. They were once human, but some other vampire turned them, for whatever reason. And then therere lamia. Those are a special kind of vampire that were actually born vampires. They were never human, but they age like a human. They're the ones that are harder to detect, because you can actually grow up with them. They can even have children, like humans or animals do.

"A lamia can stop his or her aging at any time. If they want to be five years old for the rest of their life, they can--but as soon as they start aging or they die, all those years kind of gang up on them at once."

She saw where she was going with this. "Which might be where we get the myth about them turning into desiccated corpses?"

Beth nodded. "Exactly what I was thinking. So, if this Joshua killed a very old vampire, there'd be very little blood to clean up, and there would only be basically a fleshy skeleton to pick up as he returned home. I've never been able find out about this part, but I find myself wondering: if the body was old enough, would it really just turn into dust like it does on _Buffy_? If this man Joshua killed was that old, had you stuck around you might have seen it turn into nothing but dust, in which case all Joshua would have needed to do to clean up the crime scene was a bit of wind and to retrieve his knife."

Manny stared out the window, thinking. "Lacey didn't suggest any of this."

Her dark-haired roommate grinned, revealing white teeth which, for the first time, looked a little too strong. "That's because Lacey is a witch. I'm a werewolf, or a shapeshifter, if you prefer. We think differently than witches."

She pulled up into the parking lot of the nearby Burger World. "Good thing I don't have to park. This place is always freaking busy. I'll just drop you off at the side door. Is that kosher?"

Manny nodded. "Thanks for the ride, Beth, and for the things to think about. I'll see you later today."

"No problem. Do you want to call my cell and get a ride home? I'm home free from classes all day." Manny told her she'd be fine taking the bus back to residence. She wanted the time to herself to think. "Okay. I'll see you later, kiddo."

Burger World was crowded, but then it almost always was. Personally, Manouchka preferred the breakfast (freshly made Belgian waffles with whip cream and preserves) but she had suggested it because it was a very public place. She could take security in the knowledge that no one would try anything because there were lots of other people around, so if Joshua did try to check up on her and _somehow_ managed to track her down, he wouldn't dare make a public display of it.

Poppy and Ash were sitting in a table in the middle of the restaurant, for which she was grateful. She would have felt awkward in a booth with them. Ash's clothes were a little wrinkled, as if he'd fallen asleep in the same shirt he was wearing, and he drank a coffee, wincing now and then at the bitterness of it. A little bleary-eyed, the way his hair was ruffled was utterly adorable. She wondered if his Soulmate had ever seen what he looked like first thing in the morning and knew how rumpled he looked.

Poppy, on the other hand, was bright and chipper. Wearing jeans and a brightly colored green shirt that hung off of her loosely, she looked a little like a hippy. She tapped her foot along to the music and was reading the menu, chewing a little on her bottom lip as she decided what her body would like for a snack, even if she wouldn't be able to get any nutrients from it.

"Hey guys," she said, taking up one of the other empty seats. She chose the one closer to Poppy, far away from the mercurial Ash. He still looked too close to Joshua for comfort. "How're you doing?"

"Okay," Poppy answered, sounding distracting.

Ash turned blue-green eyes to her. "Did you know that a werewolf just dropped you off at the restaurant?"

"Well, I found out last night that's what Beth is, so yeah. I knew. Why?"

"Oh, Ash, don't start that now." Poppy noticed Manny's curious expression and sighed. "Ash Redfern's a bit prejudiced about the different Night Worlders. Because they're part animal, the shapeshifters and the weres have been kind of frowned upon. People think they're less intelligent just because they sometimes go off of instincts and not think rationally. The truth is that they are what they are, and we know some very smart shifters, don't we Ash?" He shrugged noncommittally.

With a shake of her head, she gave him a good sharp kick in the shins under the table just as the waitress came along. Ash ordered another cup of coffee, and Poppy ordered a cheeseburger, medium-rare, with lots of pickles and cheese... just the way she had liked it as a human, she confided in Manny once the waitress was gone.

Manny took a quick glance at the menu and was about to order a salad when she noticed the cheeseburger listing. Her mouth salivated. She didnt even like cheeseburgers, but Poppy's order had sounded really good. She ordered the same thing, even the burger being medium rare. As the waitress took the order, Manny noticed a strange flicker in Poppys eyes, but the vampire said nothing.

"Beth is a Daybreaker, yes?" Poppy asked instead, reaching into her purse and pulling out a pen, which she handed to Ash. An eyebrow flickered over the raised coffee mug, but then he shrugged.

"That's what Lacey told me."

"Lacey right, your other roommate, the witch. Manny, we don't mean to scare you, but it's imperative that unless you know the person is a Daybreaker from a source you trust explicitly, like Lacey, please dont get into a car with them, particularly if it's a shapeshifter or a werewolf."

A crease appeared between her thin eyebrows from the force of her confused look. "I thought from what you had said a moment ago that you don't harbor ill-feelings towards them, like Ash does." Ill-feelings sounded like a friendlier word to use than prejudice.

"I don't." But Poppy shifted nervously in her seat. "Look, if you get into a car with a strange vampire, unless they're crazy or ravenous, you'll wake up with only part of your blood gone. If it a hungry werewolf, they need to eat whole body organs to feed."

"You mean..."

Ash smiled grimly. "Remember the old urban legend about the man who wakes up in a bath tub full of ice and a missing kidney? Let's just say that it's not based on fictional events like some of those other urban legends."

The idea was perfectly ghastly. "But how do I tell if someone's a human or not? I mean, not that I should be accepting rides from perfect strangers anyway, but even in conversation, how do I tell if I'm talking to a human, or a Night Worlder?"

"We in the Night World have devised a very simple way to tell one another apart since sometimes even we get confused." Ash's grin widened, thinking himself clever.

He reached over and took Poppy's hand. She wore a wedding ring made of gold, and an engagement ring. Instead of a diamond on the engagement ring, there was a series of black gems--Manny didnt know what they were, but she presumed onyx--set into the shape of roses.

"Made vampires wear black roses to identify themselves. People like me, on the other hand, called lamia..."

"Right, the vampires that are born." She grinned at his confused expression. "Beth explained that bit to me on the way over. Please, continue. This part is new to me."

"They wear black irises. In fact, black is really just a reoccurring theme, so expect anything you see to be that color." Ash rolled up his sleeve so that she could see his watch. The face had a black flower on it, and the strap had the same flower in an embossed pattern--probably, Manny figured, so that it wouldnt look too girly. "As for witches, they wear dahlias."

Manny tried to remember if she had ever seen Lacey wearing a black flower, but she didn't even know if a dahlia was a flower. "What's a dahlia?"

"It's a flower," Poppy clarified, while Ash bent over a napkin and began doodling. "Whoever came up with this system must have thought that plants would be a kind of universal symbol, but you'd be surprised how many people don't know what a dahlia looks like."

Ash spun the napkin around so that she could see his sketch. Apparently the witches flower was a small bud covered in spikes. As soon as she saw it Manny could place it. Lacey had studs in both of her ears with strange, blown glass shapes in them. Manouchka had just assumed it was the style: made of blown glass, she had seen them in a wide variety of colors and for various piercings. She had often wondered why her friend hadnt chosen something a little flashier, given her outgoing nature, but now she understood. The earrings werent supposed to be flashy.

Ash was also a very good artist, which she told him. He shrugged uncomfortably and then folded the napkin over so no one else could see the picture. "I've had a bit of practice."

Their food arrived early. Manny swallowed greedily at the aroma of her burger, which was crazy. She didn't even like burgers! She lifted it and bit into it... the pickles, the spiciness of the mustard, crispness of the lettuce, and the chewy tenderness of the burger felt like so much more to her than it normally did.

The male vampire watched her eat calmly. He took another sip of coffee before he spoke up. "You mentioned Joshua was exchanging blood with you?"

Manny nodded, unable to speak because of the food stuffed in her mouth.

"Just how much blood has he exchanged with you?"

She shrugged and swallowed. "I don't know. I don't exactly have a way to check. We've done it twice, within a few days of each other."

Ash's face was normally so closed off that Manny doubted she would have ever been able to pick up on the fear that turned his eyes grey, except that she had seen the same shiver pass through Joshua at times. Had they not been so much alike and she so accustomed to reading Joshua, it would have passed unnoticed. Instead, she felt goosebumps run up and down along her arms. What was so scary it made someone like _Ash_ afraid?

"What is it?"

Poppy answered her question gently when she saw that Ash was stubbornly avoiding looking at either of them. "Exchanging blood like that is how one makes a vampire. It means that until this bond is established and you go without drinking his blood, you're slowly becoming less human and more like Joshua. As soon as you stop drinking his blood, you'll go back to being a human again, but until then... It's like youre suspended between both. I think that's why you craved the medium-rare burger."

She tilted her head, her curly red hair pillowing around her cheek and her slanted green eyes eyeing her. "I don't think you're as far along as I was by the time I was ready to make the transition, so don't worry. If you start finding that you can only have semi-liquid foods and you can't stand the sight of any food that's not red, then you have a problem and it's become dangerous."

Gesturing to her food, she eased the tension by winking at Manny. "As you can see, you get over it soon enough. I missed cheeseburgers."

Manny sourly pushed her plate towards the red-head. "You can have mine if you want. I suddenly lost my appetite."

Joshua's blood was turning her into a vampire. The idea made her stomach churn. Did he know what his blood was doing to her? Joshua claimed and seemed to be an old vampire--even Lacey agreed with that--so surely he _must_ know. Why would he do something that would change her so? She wasn't like Poppy; she didn't _want_ to change.

She felt violated. She felt angry and abused, like he was taking advantage of her. There was no flash of support from her mind, no defense raised in his mind, and she wondered if it was because his blood wasn't as potent as it had been the night before.

His blood was turning her into a mutant.

She thought of something else that she'd spoken to Lacey about. "Have have either of you tried to use telepathy on me? Am I immune to it?"

They looked puzzled and glanced at each other, Poppy still chewing her burger. Ash answered, nodding slowly, making his blonde hair sway gently. "Ah. You're wondering why he didn't just blank your mind. It's entirely possible that you're immune to it, but because of the blood bond you've started to make, we'd get skewed results."

"Because his blood would defend me, right?" she asked, wondering if he'd lie to her about that. But Ash nodded his head, and Manny actually felt herself relax a little bit. He might have avoided telling her that his blood was actually changing her into a vampire, but at least he had been honest with her about somethings.

"What else can you tell me about the Night World?"

"What else would you like to know while Poppy pigs out on cheeseburgers?"

"How about your history? Where did you all come from?"

Ash leaned back in his chair, coffee in hand, smiling. "Ah, now that much I can explain to you, Manny. It all begins, as George Lucas got half right, a long time ago, though he messed up on the in a galaxy far, far away part..."

* * *

Manny sat in front of a computer, pen dangling from between her lips, staring at a computer screen. She was struggling to edit her paper for Professor McGugan still. It wasn't working out very well. All she could think about was the history lesson Ash had given her over lunch in Burger World. She could see them now: beautiful Maya of the vampire race, the blonde and soulful Queen of the witches, and dragons--dragons!--that had created the shapeshifters.

Her work wasn't coming along very well.

There was a knock at the front door of their residence apartment, and she heard Tanya moving around two doors down. For a moment she wondered if her senses were getting better, but then she laughed at herself. Tanya was energetic and a klutz, a dangerous combination. In her attempt to get to the front door, she;d probably tripped over her own bunny slippers, her garbage can, and then forgotten to open her bedroom door before she went through it, causing her to run into it.

Still laughing, Manny got up to answer the door and to fetch herself another drink, hoping that maybe a shot of sugar into her system would give her the boost she needed to edit the English paper. She was pouring herself some Pepsi when she heard Tanya shuffle out of her room sheepishly, her foot still stuck in a garbage can. Manny burst out laughing and, distracted, accidentally overflowed. She was beginning to clean it up when Tanya got the front door open.

"Hello?"

"Is Manouchka home? Good grief, girl! Is that a garbage can on your foot?"

Tanya giggled. "I thought Beth was coming home and was really, really anxious to greet her. Manny's in the kitchen getting herself a glass of Pepsi. Come on in. Are those for her?"

"Yeah."

In the kitchen, Manny froze, forgetting that she was holding a dishrag wet with sticky Pepsi-cola. She knew that voice. Professor McGugan! She just hoped that Lacey wouldn't come home. Thank God Tanya didn't know who Professor McGugan was! She didn't want to have to explain why her teacher was showing up at her front door at seven at night apparently holding flowers.

Frowning gravely, Heather shoved the flowers at Manny, who was still frozen with her hand over the sink, dripping soda. Heather either didn't notice it, or didn't care. "These are for you," she announced.

Manny began to move again, faced with the surly continence of the professor she remembered from lecture. She wrung out the cloth and washed her hands of the Pepsi, knowing full well that her teacher was tapping her foot, waiting for her to take the flowers from her.

The bouquet was all daisies and red flowers, including a few tiger lilies. Manny knew that they were colors which accentuated the depths of her skin tone. She took the flowers from Heather and looked for note, but couldn't find one. She took in Heather's frown. "I guess that these aren't from you?"

"No. I've been turned into a messenger girl. Apparently that's really what a BA and a Masters is worth these days: being told to deliver flowers to people when they're too scared." Her frowned lessened a little once she had gotten some of the bitterness off of her chest. "Joshua asked me to deliver these for him. He wanted me to tell you that he saw you this afternoon in Burger World with two other vampires. He's worried that you might slip up and tell them something which would put yourself or them in the same situation as Ansel."

"His enemy?" asked Manny as she searched the kitchen for a vase for the bouquet.

"Dead."

Her head shot up, jaw slack. Then her eyes hardened when she saw how serious Heather was. "Oh. I see. Well, he can remain assured that I didn't let anything slip. They were explaining things to me, not the other way around."

"Joshua would appreciate it if you wouldn't talk to them."

Something in Manny snapped. She stopped looking for a vase and faced her professor. Her brown eyes were aflame with ferocity. "Why did you bring me the flowers if you didn't want to?" she asked. Heather didn't answer right away, so Manouchka pressed her point. "If you didn't want to be made messenger girl; if you thought that this was beneath you; why didn't you tell Joshua to stuff it and to _stop_ ordering you around and bring it himself? If he's as old as we seem to think he is, then he should darn well be mature enough to show up and to _ask_ me not to do something that he thinks is dangerous rather than send someone else!"

Heather looked positively aghast. Her eyes actually widened and her jaw actually dropped. Manny's worst fears were confirmed. "Tell Joshua no? I couldn't!"

Great, she sighed. I'm dealing with an old, strong, _telepathic_ vampire who's not just a bully, but a spoiled brat! No wonder he didn't stop when he wanted to exchange blood the day before! The idea that Manny might have been the first person to tell _Joshua_ no in a few hundred years was frightening! But also laughable.

"Why couldn't you say no?"

"Because... because he asked me to.''

She arched an eyebrow suspiciously. "You mean he _told_ you to."

"No," she snapped, agitated. Heather was a grown woman and didn't like being corrected by a little girl, particularly one who was also her student. Had it just been a young girl it would have been embarrassing; as her student it was demeaning. "He asked me to do it, as in he asked me: Heather, would you be kind enough to take these flowers to Manny on your way home? And then I said yes."

"But why say yes when you didn't want to?"

"Because I couldn't," she admitted, though not with defeat. She was still defending him, saying she couldn't say no because he'd asked so politely, been such a gentleman. After her conversation with Lacey, Manny could _not_ accept it as coincidence. It was a form of manipulation, and she simply abhorred the idea of him using it on her.

She handed the flowers back to Professor McGugan, and her voice was a hiss so venomous that it actually frightened her. "Take these back to Joshua. Tell him that he can shove them where the sun doesn't shine for all I care! I'm not his pet that he can order around, and I wasn't doing anything! I want to know just what kind of a mess I'm getting into here, and since he can't seem to tell me anything about this Night World, then I'll get others to tell me about it. And the _next_ time that he has a problem with something I'm doing, he can damn well come and tell me about it himself rather than sending a messenger!"

Manny slammed the door shut in Heather's face, who was still too stunned to react. She stormed off to bed, but ended up staring at the ceiling, too angry to sleep.

* * *

To be continued...


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Apparently Joshua thought enough of Manny to take her suggestion.

The following evening he appeared at her front door. Home alone, her roommates in class, Manny opened the door and then stood there, frozen.

The pang that burst suddenly within her heart whenever she saw Joshua, or when he did something particularly beautiful or sentimental, had not gone away. Manny was, in fact, nearly convinced they had become stronger. Seeing him standing at her doorstep made her knees feel suddenly very weak, like limp spaghetti. Her hand tightened on the door knob and, despite the feeling of happiness flooding her face with warmth, the muscle of that armed tensed in case she needed to slam the door in his face.

Neither was the desire to be close to him, the feeling of soaking up his presence like a cat in the sun, strong enough to keep him from placing her free hand on her hip and saying: "So, Professor McGugan decided to take my advice and tell you off?"

Much to the surprise of both of them, her snotty comment made him smile. The fact that his eyes were a brilliant shade of blue divulged that he was as happy to see her as she was to see him.

"Not in so many words," he admitted. "She gave me a stern lecture about what a coward I was for not bringing you the message myself, and how demeaning it was for her to be turned out by one of her own students. She then decided to add in a few comments about the status of my social availability which infuriated me to the point of actually raising my voice.

"Normally, he said, seeing her confused face, "when someone gets me angry, I just slip into their mind and silence them. She actually made me mad enough to forget about telepathy and yell at her. That turned it into a yelling match. Sadly, I forget how used she's become to projecting in lecture halls. I consider myself considerably cowed."

"So does this mean you're here to plant the suggestion in my mind never to give the professor another idea like that again?"

Briefly, his eyes darkened to the smoldering amethyst, but then they returned when he looked away from her face. Manny's comment had upset him. Joshua was disgusted by Manny's opinion of him. She always seemed to think that he intended the worst. He wasn't ready to speak until he had his anger under control, worried that if he spoke before he was ready he was going to use telepathy to bend her to his will. Doing so would only make Manny think she was right and he was a monster.

His respite gave Manny time to speak instead. She glanced up and down the hallway. "You can only enter into this building if you have the key. So how'd you get in?"

Joshua felt a dry chuckle begin in his throat at her question, but held it back at the last moment. He shrugged and pressed past her into the apartment. "You don't need to see someone's eyes to use telepathy, Manny, not if you're strong enough."

She sighed as she shut the door. "And of course you'd be strong enough."

He grinned, revealing sharp white teeth. At the sight of them Manny forgot the conversation she'd had with Poppy, Ash and Lacey. Instead, there was the flooding need to simply _give_. She felt suddenly very antsy, as if standing on pins and needles which also threaded her pants, making each step itch. If he didn't ask to bite her, she was certain that she would simply fling herself at him, neck bared.

Manny struggled to get control of those emotions, and managed to fight them back down. She could remember the anger sh'ed felt knowing that giving Joshua the security he wanted would come at the cost of her free will, but she could not harness it back. It lingered, just out of touch, as if it had happened years ago and was no more than a touchy subject.

"I've done it before, and practice makes perfect." He turned away from her, smile gone, and looked up and down the apartment appraisingly. He sneered when he saw the blue box full of Pepsi-Colas waiting to be taken out. It smelled disgustingly sweet. "The residences are a good place to feed. I just randomly picked someone, told them I was their friend coming to visit them. They buzzed me in right away."

With a frown, she followed him to her room. She wondered how he knew where she was, but then, he _had_ been in her apartment before. He walked in and stood there for a moment, soaking up the ambience. Manny watched him curiously as he circled the room, now and again touching something gently--a stuffed animal she'd had since she was six, a textbook laying open on her desk, the edge of her bed--with a slowness that bordered on reverence, as if pausing to ponder why it was important to her. Manny was beginning to feel strangely exposed.

"I was wondering if perhaps you'd be so kind as to pack a bag for overnight."

Manny was taken aback. She stared at him. "Pardon?'

"If I were to tell you to simply pack a bag than I would be ordering you around again, wouldn't I? This way I've asked politely. You can always say no."

"Good then. I'm saying no." He narrowed his eyes at her, and she sighed, gesturing to her computer. "I'm currently working on a paper. I need to rewrite it in order to resubmit it on time. I don't have time for whatever it is you have planned."

"In case you havent noticed Manny, you tend to be physically and mentally exhausted after we exchange blood. I thought that this way you could just sleep over. I've made up the spare room for you so that you can have your own bed."

It was sweet, she thought. He really was trying hard to be kind to her. Her expression softened. "I appreciate that, Joshua, I really do, but I have school work that I've been neglecting because of all of this Night World stuff. Can we push it back another night? Is that at all possible?"

He actually looked a little hurt. "Manny, I came here to feed so that I would be satiated when it came to trading blood with you. I don't want to put you in danger by taking too much too often, but it is important to me that we do this." His frowned deepened. "I do actually have a computer at my house, you know. You can work on your essay there until youre ready to bed, and then we can do it."

She sighed. That was a logic with which Manny couldnt argue, particularly if he'd actually made up her room there for her, even if it was annoying and rude that he'd keep pestering her despite her already saying no. She was being given a choice, but it wasn't really real. "And if I keep saying no?"

Joshua smirked faintly. Manny could almost think she was imagining it if she didn't know him so well. His eyes gave him away with their bright blue, because his mouth barely moved when he smiled. 'Then you know I have no problems kidnapping you."

That was true. He had no problems knocking her out and carrying her out the back door. If it was true that vampires had superhuman strength, she imagined that he could get her home that way in as much time as he could drive. Would carrying her up the steep college hill even cause him to break a sweat?

"I'll pack a bag then, I suppose.'

It didn't take her very long to get ready. She packed pajamas, some toiletries, and a spare change of clothes, then left a quick note on Lacey's bedroom door. She winced, thinking that if Beth and Tanya found out she was spending the night at Joshua's they would never stop hounding her. The entire time, Joshua stood at her bookcase, inspecting her collection, now and then offering to help.

She only laughed at him, and made a comment about how he really wanted to snoop.

* * *

As the garage led into the kitchen, Manny found herself once again standing in front of the island, feeling at home with the dark wood of the kitchen and the stone work floor. This time, the kitchen was otherwise occupied. Professor Heather McGugan, glasses perched on the end of her nose, was leaning over a large bowl, baking utensils scattered on the island.

She looked up when the door closed and smiled brightly at both of them. With the exception of her librarian-like glasses, she didn't look much like the Professor Manny knew. Wearing lounge pants and a sweater that was dusted lightly with flour and sugar, she nodded to the recipe book.

"I'm making scones. Would you like some when they come out of the oven, Manny?"

She smiled back. "Do Scotsmen eat scones? I thought that was an English thing."

"Och, aye, it is," she laughed, accent breaking out in rough, husky waves. "But I developed a taste for them while I was living in London."

"You lived in London?"

She nodded and began to whisk together the dry ingredients. "Yes, I did my undergrad there. Joshua and I had a small flat near the campus. In those days, let's see, he was pretending to be my younger brother. That was our cover." He grinned at her as he hung up his jacket and took Manny's from her to place it in the closet. "Aye, those were the good days. It became embarassin' to tell people that you were my son to cover up our age when ye used to change my sheets when I had an accident as a bairn, but I didna mind it much when we were sibs."

"Your accent," Manny pointed out bluntly, "is much thicker when youre at home.'

"Aye," she laughed. "Iv'e worked hard to be able t'control it while I'm in the lecture hall. It wouldna help me keep my job much if none'o' the students could understand me due to my burr."

Manny glanced over at Joshua. His eyes were bright blue again, and were gazing at Heather with love. From his expression she knew that he wasn't in love with her (there wasn't the deep, glistening kind of brilliance in his eyes Manny had read the body produced, chemically making your eyes sparkle when one is in love) but he looked at her with adoration and pride. He looked at her that way Manny's father had looked at her when she had graduated from high school.

"I'll be takin Manny t'the study," he told her, with an accent so suddenly thick it was hard for Manny to understand him. "She's wheedlin' away on a paper fer ye."

"Is she now?' Heather winked at the girl in question.

She shifted nervously in the kitchen, knowing that now she _had_ to get her paper done on time. As he continued talking to Heather, Manny struggled to contain the desire to kick him and make him shut up. She had homework to do!

Finally, blissfully, Professor McGugan finished mixing her batter and glanced at the clock. "Oh, Joshua, will ye just go on an take her up to the office? She has work to do, an jabberin' away like a hen wont help to get it done an over wit'. I'll bring up some freshly brewed tea and the scones when the come out o' the oven. Now, git on with ye."

"I'll be right behind you, Joshua." He shrugged and went on ahead. She already knew where the study was, after all, and didn't need to be escorted there. Manny turned to her teacher and sighed. "Professor, I know that talking to you like this is highly unprofessional..."

She grinned, pouring the batter into the pan she was using. "What? I assume you mean talking of schoolwork in my own home over raw scone mix."

Manny nodded. "I was wondering if I might have a few more days for that paper rewrite?" Her heart began to sink when she saw Heather raise her eyebrows, but she pressed on hopefully, keeping her voice strong. "I was nearly done the rewrite on my current thesis, but then, after spending all this time with Joshua, I had an idea for a different thesis, and so I need a little bit more time to do so further research and editing."

"And your new idea is?"

She blushed, though the change in color was scarcely visible on her dark cheeks. She lowered her eyes demurely, gaze affixed in the doorway and praying that Joshua wasnt in range. "You won't tell Joshua, will you?'

"Not a word of it shall pass these lips."

"I'm thinking of concentrating on the portrayal of the Green Knight and exploring his attraction. He's described as being an alien in their midst, different, but only after he reveals himself to be a giant. There's a strange fascination that people in the court seem to feel for him, and I want to discuss why. What is it about those that are different that makes them horrifying, but ultimately attractive?"

Heather pursed her lips, but she seemed pleased with Manny's proposal. 'I will gladly give you more time to write something that ambitious. Besides, since my students who are Night Worlders don't realize that I know of it, this might be my only chance to get to see that aspect of society examined within the context of literature. I can see now why you dont wan't Joshua to know about it. I can see his influence in your proposal."

Manny flushed. "You can?'

"Exploring the underlying attraction of the supernatural? Come now, Manny. He might be my life partner, my father and my brother _and_ my editor, but even I can tell that he's an incredibly good looking." She laughed. "Like sex on a stick."

Another person who said sex on a stick! Manny really needed to understand what this saying meant. Then she thought of Matt Aspen and began to realize what it meant. With those gorgeous eyes and that dimple in his cheek when he smiled, there was nothing on earth cuter than Matt Aspen.

Giving her a brief goodbye, Manny hurried to the study on the third floor. The first floor, she had learned, was the communal area. Both Heather and Joshua spent their time there. The second floor was Heather's bedroom, office, and personal library. It was where she went if she needed a break from Joshua, which, she had pointed out to Manny, happened rather frequently due to how long they'd had to get on each others nerves. Joshua had the third floor to himself, and had used one room as an exercise room. With his vampire skills, he moved as quietly as a cat, and often Heather didn't know there was a third floor in the house.

He was just finishing moving a second chair into the study when Manny walked in. This time she had time to look around his office. A dark wooden desk sat in the corner, stretching from one end of the room to the other, a computer at one end and neat paperwork stacked in the other end. A few paintings adorned the cream-coloured walls, the only source of real color in the room. Both pictures were of mountain scenes, and Manny wondered if it was Scotland portrayed in them. The other two walls of the room were covered in tall bookcases, the very tops of them a wide variety of statues and small pieces of art.

Joshua gestured to the computer desk. "You can use that computer if you want."

"Thanks." Manny slung her book bag down and sat in the chair, turning the computer on. She wasn't aware of Joshua moving while she waited for it to boot up until he sat next to her in front of the large piles of paper. "What are you doing?"

"Just editing. I'm not exactly ready for bed yet."

Manny took another look at the large stack of papers. It had to be at least two and a half inches thick. She couldn't imagine having the patience to be able to tackle something that looked so daunting, but Joshua just clicked a pen and began scribbling away.

"I like the pictures in your room," she commented, trying to make small talk.

"Uh-huh."

Rolling her eyes, Manny returned to her own work. She typed away furiously at the computer, now and again looking up a reference and then typing out a quotation or two. It was actually going fairly well, and she barely noticed when Heather came in with fresh tea and warm scones. Joshua pressed a cup of the warm tea into her hand, which she drank blindly, continuing away on her roll.

When she came to a mental blockade, she stopped typing and slumped in her chair, defeated. Glancing at Joshua, she found him still making notes and sigils on the manuscript with deft, quick hands. He didn't seem tired at all, and worked relentlessly, but at an easy, nearly bored pace.

She spotted a stress ball sitting by the side of the computer, and grinned. How would he react to being hit with a stress ball in the head? Snarling, bullying Joshua might react badly to it. But the smiling, sweet Joshua slowly being revealed to her... She giggled and picked up the ball. He'd probably react badly to it, too. Manny knew she shouldn't do it, but it was just too tempting. He was lost in his own little world and the strange little thump in her heart when she looked at him told her that she should do it.

With barely a glance at him, Manny shot the stress ball. It smacked against the side of his head with a satisfying sound, and then bounced off of him. Manny was a pretty good shot, and shrunk back into the office chair, giggling. She couldn't hear him move, but she knew that he was turning around to look at her, weighing his own options.

"What was that for?'

She shrugged, knowing that he couldn't see it, but guessing that he could hear her clothes moving against the fabric of the chair. "You weren't really talking to me, and I became bored."

"So you thought to hit me with a stress ball?"

Manny glanced around the chair to see him smirking. There was no dimple in his cheek from the half-smile, as she'd noticed there was when Matt Aspen smirked, but it was a little cute nonetheless. He held the stress ball in question in his hand. She had just registered it when he threw it at her gently--but gently for a vampire was still enough for it to hit her enough to wince.

Her jaw dropped. 'I can't believe that you threw it back at me." She scooped the ball back up, rolling it around in her hand and stared at it, knowing she had his attention now. For a moment she felt her anger flare up, but it was still water under the bridge in Joshua's presence. 'So, despite the fact that you can use your presence to influence me, after seeing you and Heather together, I do find myself reconsidering this whole thing..."

"Oh?"

"Well, its just that you seem so happy," she admitted. "I think I might actually be a little bit jealous."

Joshua frowned, but it was mild. "Manny, you should know that what Heather and I have... it's special. Not every relationship I've had with human beings has been like that. In fact, most of the time, it's reminiscent of the feelings you might have for a special pet."

Manny felt her smile vanish as her mouth pulled down into disapproving frown. "Are you trying to tell me that you think of me as your _pet_?"

She expected some kind of a flirtatious answer--or found herself hoping for one--but she knew that realistically he was going to be offended and logically point of the differences between her and a pet. Instead, he turned away, avoiding her gaze. It was a telltale sign of guilt, and Manny found her heart suddenly sink. Her hand gripped the ball tighter, and this time, she flung the stress ball at him with all the strength she could muster.

"Will you stop that?" he snarled, turning back to look at her.

'I will, but only because now the stress ball is on your side of the room, and I doubt you'd give it back to me so I can throw it at you again.' Manny's left hand groped for something else to throw at him--a pen or pencil or _something_.

"You little idiot." Manny saw him roll his eyes from the corner of her vision. His voice was still snarling, but yet there was a warmth in the word idiot she had'nt expected. He leaned out of his seat and grabbed the corner of the chair, spinning her around to see him properly, as well as keeping her from grabbing another projectile. "I never said that. I looked guilty because I _don't_ feel that way, but I'm supposed to! I don't understand it. With Heather, feelings of fondness were acceptable because she was a _child_ when I met her, but there's no logic to justify the way I _don't _hate you the way I'm supposed to."

The sweet part of Manny wanted to suggest that perhaps the reason why was because he was too kind to really be a part of that dark aspect of the Night World shed only heard of from Poppy and Ash. The humorous part of her wanted to tell him that it was because of her cute nature, but she knew that she didn't really have a cute nature. Tanya, she thought, was so cute it would rot a vampire's teeth, but Manny was simply Manny.

"Maybe you're just a bit attracted to me because you know that I hate you, so it could never be reciprocated," she said sharply, and he laughed. She scowled at him, wondering what he found so happy that he'd laugh at her comment.

"Perhaps,' he agreed, and the grip he held on the arms of the chair relaxed. Manny felt herself relax as a result, surprised that she had become so tense as soon as he came close to her. "But I think youre exaggerating when you tell me that you hate me. You know why I killed Ansel--that it was self-defense because he meant to tell the Council about Heather..."

"What's the Council?" Manny interrupted.

"Ah, the Council..." He sat back in his chair and was silent a long moment, stroking the cleft in his chin as he thought. "The Council is our government, our ruling body. They make the rules, and when you break the rules, they try you for it and they administer the punishment. I was a part of the Council for sometime, until I tired of it and turned over my seat to some younger vampire. Two thousand years was long enough on the Council for me."

Manny felt shocked; as if a bucket of ice water had just been dumped down her back. "Two _thousand_?" After talking with Lacey, she'd come to terms with the fact that this man who looked a year younger than she was might actually be a few centuries old, not a few _thousand_ years!

"Jesus Christ! Thats older than than..."

"Jesus Christ?"

She glared at Joshua and his self-satisfied smile. "Yes." She struggled to find a way to change the topic until she could come to terms with this new information. It wasn't everyday one met someone who had been alive since before the fall of the Roman Empire. "So I guess that you being an ex-Council member, it's even more important that they not find out how you've been living for these past years, huh?'

He chuckled again and closed the manuscript. "Indubitably. If they knew that I was saving children from car accidents and telling people about the Night World and living in the same house as a human, they'd punish me as harshly as they could."

"But isn't the penalty death?"

His eyes clouded over a moment, to a shade Manouchka hadn't seen before. It was grey, but instead of the blue-grey she was used to seeing, this color had no trace of blue. It was grey, the color of metal or silver without the luster. She could see the paleness laying under his tanned skin and felt a shiver when she recognized the emotion. It was fear. When she opened her mouth to speak, she could almost taste his fear, sour, on the tip of her tongue.

"There are many ways to kill somebody, Manny. The harshness of the penalty they administer is judged by how long it takes the condemned to die."

"What's the most merciful?" Manny knew it was rude to ask, but the question was out. Manny was not one to use tact, not when the information of how to kill a vampire was now a clue to how to survive in the Night World. She wanted to know how to defend herself.

He eyed her perceptively, then seemed to settle on telling her. Apparently he had concluded she wasn't asking to know how to kill _him_, so it was okay to tell her. "Vampires," he said, "are susceptible to wood, just like in the movies. Staking a vampire, however, is rather messy and painful. It's hardly the best way to kill one."

"So they don't really poof into dust like in television?" Lacey had basically said as much, but Manny wanted confirmation from a real vampire. She was appeased when Joshua nodded.

'They don't go poof. They bleed, and struggle to breathe and pump blood, just like a human would if you stabbed them in a heart. But of course, human vampire hunters don't like to think that they're stabbing a sentient being, the way a murderer stabs an innocent victim, so they call it staking to sanitize it and," he admitted, trying to be fair, "because they did originally use wooden stakes. The most humane method of killing a vampire is to behead them.'

Manny was stunned, and she stammered something unintelligible, but Joshua seemed to understand. He nodded. "Yes, it was easier to behead another vampire centuries ago, when one actually carried swords. That's why I carry this instead.'

He reached behind him, under the back of his shirt, and pulled out a sheathe. The dagger was still inside, and he motioned for Manny to extract it. She did so, feeling a little awkward. The knife she held was a dagger too large for her hand. It was made for someone Joshua's size, and though there was only a few inches between them, the dagger felt large and gangly.

To her surprise, the blade was made of wood, not metal, and kept so polished the blade glistened as it were metal. The edge was so sharp that when she ran her thumb across it she felt the dangerous flick across her skin and then the sharp tang of blood. Joshua stiffened, knowing she'd cut herself. Manny quickly stuck her thumb in her mouth, cutting off the smell of blood.

The handle of the knife was inlaid with silver, and it coated the first inch of the length of the blade. She wondered what it was for, and then spoke around her injured finger. 'What's the silver for?"

"Shapeshifters. Just like vampires are weak against wood, silver is poisonous to shapeshifters. They can't even wear it without breaking out into blisters and hives. This way I don't have to carry around two different weapons."

"What about witches?"

"Witches are essentially humans with powers," he said, gently taking the sheathe and the dagger back from her. He sheathed it and then put it back in his belt, the weapon hidden just out of sight. "They can catch colds, be hurt by any sharp blade, but they do live a longer time. If you want to contain their power, though, iron is what you need."

Joshua looked over at her, scrutinizing her expression, when she didn't keep asking questions. He found her looking curious, but a little thoughtful, and more than a little overwhelmed. It was refreshing to be around someone whose face was so beautifully expressive. Most Night Worlders learned not to let their emotions show, but she was from the human world, with a human face, where emotions lay far too close to the surface.

"What is it?"

She sighed and began plucking balls of fluff from her socks. It was rather unkempt of her, but at the same time, a display of her naivety. Joshua would have agreed with her earlier thoughts. Manny was not cute, but he would have pointed out that her naivety and human view of the world was refreshing.

"It's just... you're so old. How old are you, _really_? You only said that you served on the council for two thousand years."

His face remained neutral. "I was turned into a vampire eight thousand years ago, give or take a few centuries. It's hard to keep track after so many years."

He watched as Mannys face paled. "Eight thou... eight. Wow."

She leaned back in her chair and stared at the computer screen. He opened the manuscript again and tried to recall where he had left off. He heard her shuffle uncomfortably, and it irked him. Was age really that important to her? Did she really have that much trouble accepting it?

'So does that make you the first vampire?'

"No," he answered curtly, and he heard her exhale with relief. "The first vampire has a couple thousand years on me. She was made back when..."

"She?" Manny interrupted.

"Yes; she. The first one of our kind was a female. It's a long story. I'll tell it to you some other time, if you're interested."

Manny flashed him a wide grin, made earnest by the prospect of a story. The longer, she thought, the better. It gave her more time to be able to enjoy his accent. "Yes, please! So, okay, you're not the oldest, but you're still really, really old, aren't you?"

A faint smile tugged at his lips. "I thought your file said you were an English major."

"Pardon me for not being more verbose about it." She rolled her eyes. "But you are, arent you? You're ancient."

"I suppose so...' He didnt really know if he liked being called ancient.

"I mean, things your age get locked up and preserved in a vault, while their replicas are placed under glass and displayed." Her husky voice was slow, cautious as she tried to make her point. "I can understand the detraction in not wanting to be around people, of shutting yourself away in a vault of your own making. You've seen civilizations rise and fall, and within that time, friends have come and gone and might very well have been nothing more than mayflies to you."

She noticed it when his eyes turned to the deep blue that signified his undeniable rage. Now she knew why it looked as deep as the ocean: he was so old that his anger was as fathomless as the ocean, and just as strong. He might take awhile to anger, but when he did it was all he felt, she thought. Manny realized that she'd gotten her point across.

"It just seems like it's a very lonely existence."

The depth faded from his eyes, leaving them their normal pale blue-grey. He turned back to his manuscript. "Aye, lass, it is."

Manny watched him for a moment longer and then she nodded. "I was ready for sleep, but now I think I have a bit more inspiration after talking to you."

"Glad I could help." Manny was surprised to hear the sarcasm, but she decided to take it as a good sign.

They once again worked in silence. Manny typed away furiously, fueled on the by the understanding she had of Joshua's loneliness. He, like the Green Giant in the poem she studied, at once hated society because they were forever separate from it, and yet longed to be a part of it too. So the question was, did they throw themselves blindly into it, knowing that they would only be hurt in the end, or did they hide from it and suffer the weight of immortality alone?

She glanced at Joshua now and then, lips parted softly as she realized the weight he carried. Her hands itched to hold him, to tell her that she'd help bear his loneliness for him. Where had her anger gone? Where was her frustration? Where was her fear of him?

It had vanished in those few words hed told her: _Aye, lass, it is._

Manny shut the computer down and spun her office chair around. He was still working away, though he lifted his head when he heard the motor of the computer gently come to a stop. She didn't say anything as she slid from her seat and into his lap, noting the way that his hands were braced tightly to the arms of his chair, and his back pressed against the back of it. He looked nervous, and she almost felt bad for him as she balanced herself on her knees.

She didn't know what to do now that she was sitting there. She tilted back her neck, giving him ample view of her throat, and watched his gaze trace along the curve of her neck, lingering here and there where the blood beat close to the surface. He licked his lips so quickly she barely noticed it.

"You sure that you want to do this again, Manny? I won't need much, since I fed before."

He was actually giving her a way out. He was actually giving her a _choice_! Manny felt touched, and she knew that she was frightened. Those teeth... those _fangs_! Surely it would hurt; she couldn't imagine exchanging blood being a nice experience, like Lacey had told her it was supposed to be. Those fangs had not been designed as pure decoration!

She nodded, closing her eyes and resigning herself to this task. She had told him that she would do this, she couldn't wait for Lacey, and with this change she was seeing in him, she knew that he wouldn't be ordering her around. As he had said, he felt something for her, even though he knew he shouldn't feel anything. The thought of being _special_ to someone warmed her and gave her the courage to go on.

Joshua raised a hand to her face, rubbing his thumb over her cheek gently, and he felt her shiver at his touch. He flinched away, thinking it a shiver of disgust, but her hands closed about his wrist and kept it there. With his hand, he guided her face down to his, noting the way she kept her eyes shut so she couldn't see what was going on. Her expression and her scent revealed the truth. She _was_ scared.

His lips slowly closed over hers before he gave it much consideration. He wanted to kiss her, to know what she tasted like. She tasted of the slightest hint of scone and herbal tea. She kissed him back uncertainly, her small grip tightening around his wrist. Joshua adored the hesitation in her kiss, the way she wasn't quite certain of what to do, the way she hesitated her and there.

His lips traveled down to her chin, his hands around her waist now as he helped to steady her in the chair. She sighed as he nuzzled against her neck and heard her mumble something about how he reminded her of a cat. As soon as he opened his mouth, though, he heard her squeak in fear and tense in his arms. He closed his mouth, nuzzling her once more, and she relaxed, but as soon as she knew he meant to bite her, she once again stiffened. Joshua could smell her fear, and it was beginning to churn his stomach.

"This willna do," he said, lifting his head.

Manny pouted. "But..."

"Lass," he said gently, fixing her hair so that it lay properly. "You're scared. I'm not like the others. I don't like the taste of fear, or the stench of it. It's kind and brave of you to try, but it's much easier for both of us when you're asleep."

He smiled. Joshua wouldn't tell her, but she looked so happy when she was asleep. Her mouth turned up faintly, delicate lashes laying against the apple of her cheeks. She looked sweet and young when she slept, but it was the smile he loved the most. Manouchka had pleasant dreams when she slept; pleasant enough that she lay still and smiled until she awoke. He found himself sometimes wondering, in the wee hours of the night, what she dreamed of, but he didn't have the heart to ask her.

Joshua reached out and touched her forehead. He didn't even have to use a touch of suggestion. Simply his voice was enough for the blood bond they had to already start working. "Sleep, Manny, and dream of pretty things."

She collapsed at once in his arms, and he held her for a moment, listening to her steady breathing and watching the ghostly smile appear, before he set about doing his business.

* * *

to be continued...


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

Manny woke up the following morning feeling positively radiant. She yawned, stretched in the large bed, and nearly snuggled back into the warmth provided by the thick comforter when she smelled breakfast cooking from the kitchen. Licking her lips, she leapt from the bed and went at once to the washroom for a quick shower. She would not go to breakfast with Joshua and Professor McGugan armed in green flannel penguin pajamas.

She caught sight of herself in the bathroom window and grinned. She looked well-rested, and decided that the lighting in the bathroom did something for her complexion. There was no trace of blemish on her skin--not a single blackhead or zit or sunspot--and her cheeks looked plump with her smile. She could just imagine the temptation her grandmother would have in pinching a cheek like that! The thought made her grin brighter.

Her teeth were white in the mirror, startling against the darkness of her skin. Her eyes were bright brown, the color of rich mocha, she thought. It prompted a storm of giggles as she imagine a man trying to romance her with a line like that! 'I want to drown myself in the coffee of your eyes,' was hardly the most romantic thing she could think of a man saying to her.

After a quick shower, she dressed in a warm orange sweater and jeans for the day and hurried down for breakfast.

"Good morning!" Heather called out when she heard Manny walk into the kitchen. She was scrambling eggs in a pan, and there was already a pile of roasted sausages sitting on a large plate. "You look chipper this morning."

"I feel good," she agreed, and took her usual spot in the kitchen. It smelled delicious. There were leftover tea biscuits, sausages, eggs, English muffins with a variety of jams and spreads, and a large pitcher of fruit punch. Manny laughed. "You've made a feast!"

"Well, I felt like a bad host these past few days. You were comin' over, and I wasna feeding you. I thought that this time I would make it up to you. I think I have a good, hearty breakfast far ye. I dinnae have parritch, though."

"Oh, I dont need porridge," Manny said, and poured herself a glass of juice. She picked up a sausage from the plate and brought it to her mouth, but she had no interest in eating it. Manny grabbed a spare plate and set it down, until she felt like eating it. She settled, for the moment, for drinking her juice. "I don't normally eat this much for breakfast, you know."

Heather glanced over her shoulder at the girl, grinning. "Maybe if you did you'd get better marks in my classes. How did your essay go last night?"

"Not bad," Manny said rather non-committal. She looked around at the feast in the kitchen. "Where _is_ Joshua, anyway? He's going to help us eat all this, right?"

The professor shook her head. "This is all for you and I. Dinnae worry if you can't eat it all, lass. It just means that I'll have breakfast ready for myself for the rest of the week."

Looking around at all the food, Manny knew there was no way she could even make a dent in it! Much to her surprise, the idea of eating so much food churned her stomach--particularly the sausage that sat on her plate. Manny loved sausages, but the smell of sight of it was beginning to churn her stomach. She sipped her fruit punch, annoyed with the sweetness of the drink, but it did settle her appetite a little.

"Joshua's out in the backyard," Heather continued, gesturing with a jut of her chin in the direction of the backyard. "Practicin'."

"Practicing _what_?" Manny looked in the direction Heather had pointed and her eyebrows furrowed as she frowned. "It's _snowing_ outside!"

From her seat in the kitchen, Manny could see large white snowflakes descending in dancing circles from the sky. It wasn't a blizzard, but if it kept falling in such thick clouds there would be a large layer of snow across North Bay. She ran to the window and lifted the curtain. Already the grass was barely visible, nothing more than triangular tufts poking out of a field of white. The trees, naked without their leaves, were becoming plastered in a shiny white coating. The sky was a dark grey, promising not to let up until the city was shut down with a healthy dumping of snow.

The sight of it made her want to jump and down for joy. Snow! She could already taste the hot chocolate, the candy canes, and smell the Christmas turkey cooking. There was nothing that warmed her heart quite like the snow and its promise of quiet, simple times.

The sight of Joshua, in contrast, made her suddenly freeze and simply watch him. She knew that he could fight--she had seen him fight Ansel, after all. She just hadn't noticed at the time how beautifully he moved. It was a little like a ballet, watching him dance around the backyard, making quick jabs with his fists and fly up into the air with kicks. Wearing only a tank top and a pair of lounge pants, Manny was concerned for him.

"Won't he catch cold doing that in the snow?"

Heather laughed. "Vampires, much to my chagrin at times, dinnae catch colds, Manny."

"Oh." She watched him a moment longer before she let the curtain close and returned to her seat. "Do you think he knew I was watching him? When he killed Ansel, he was moving so fast I could barely even see the punches, but now he's doing it slowly. Do you think..." She felt herself blush and tried vainly to hide it behind her juice cup. "Do you think he was showing off for me?"

The professor smiled knowingly. "Maybe."

Manny grinned, knowing she was being silly. So Joshua felt differently about her than he was supposed to. Big deal! It wasn't like she was getting a crush on him Or something. Manny felt her insides shift just a little at the idea of crushing on Joshua. He was way too old for her, and even if he was only a few centuries like Lacey had suggested, he'd _still_ be too old for her.

She polished off the rest of her juice and then reached for the pitcher to pour herself another glass, ignoring the rest of the food Heather had prepared. She was eyeing the English muffins and the strawberry jam, wondering if she would find that too sweet as well, when it struck her. She was only eating the things at the table that were _red_!

She remembered Poppy's warning and put her glass down in a hurry. "I need to go to school!" Manny announced, in the same rushed voice people use when they announce they need a washroom before they're ill on the floor.

Her heart pounded as she scrambled to pack her backpack and leave.

The craving for red things, the lack of appetite, the energy that flowed through her, the way she could see Joshua's limbs as he punched, the way she looked in the mirror... good god! He was changing her; whether by mistake or on purpose, he was changing her! He had to stop exchanging blood with her. He had to wait a few more days, to get it out of her system and let her make sure she was staying human.

She'd go to school, calm down, and they would talk about it like rational adults, she thought. Manny shuddered at the very idea.

She was a human. She didn't want to become part of the Night World anymore than she already had.

* * *

Manny opened her locker, tossing her overnight bag inside and then beginning to rummage around for her school notebook. She had just begun a wrestling contest with one of the books in question when she heard footsteps coming towards her. It was neither the meandering steps of someone lost, nor the swift, sure-footed steps of someone knowing where they were going. They approached quickly and then slowed cautiously as they approached her locker.

Even though there was no logic for her actions, she stopped wrestling with her textbook and reached into her knapsack for a pencil. It seemed like a good a weapon as any. She didn't know why she was preparing to fight whoever it was, but it seemed like as natural a reaction as running away. But she didn't want to run away. She gritted her teeth and held the pencil tighter. She _wanted_ to fight!

"Hey there."

The voice was friendly, charming, and Manny recognized it at once. There was only one voice that would be so confident and smooth, as rich and warm as chocolate. Matt Aspen.

She jerked herself out of her locker, throwing her pencil in and slamming the locker shut. She quickly ran her tongue over her teeth, making sure they were clean for a gleaming smile--and making sure that she didn't have fangs, given her recent taste in breakfasts.

"M... Matt!"

"Yeah." Standing a full foot and a half over her, he ran his hand through his hair rather nervously. Manny suddenly felt like what it must be to be Tanya and needing to look up at every man she saw. He smiled and she needed to reach behind her and support herself on the door to her locker. But his dimple was just the cutest thing in the whole world! "Manny, right?"

He knew her name! She jumped and giggled wildly in her mind, but outside she just nodded. "That's right."

"Good," he laughed, "I was worried I'd make an ass of myself if I got it wrong."

"Nothing you could do would ever make you an ass," Manny said, before she thought about it. She said exactly what was on her mind, and regretted it. What if that sounded too much like a stalker? But Matt just blushed and she felt her heart go wild. He _blushed_! The man was bloody _perfect_!

"Thanks. Um, listen, I have something to ask you. There's this thing that the student council is doing tonight. It's just a dance. I was supposed to go with the vice-president, but she can't go anymore. Anyway, we've been in a couple classes and stuff, and just over this past week, I've really started to notice you, you know? So I was wondering, if maybe you didn't think it was too forward of me, if maybe you'd like to be my escort to the dance tonight."

Manny stared at him.

"I know it's last minute, and don't worry if you don't have anything to wear. I mean, it's kind of a jeans a t-shirt kind of dance, so..."

"No!" Manny's voice cut through his, and he fell silent at once. "No, I mean. I want to go with you. I don't have any other plans for tonight, and I'm sure that I can find something or other to wear."

His wide smile made the dimple on his cheek stand out even more, blue eyes twinkling and curly hair looking wildly untamed. "That's great. Do you want me to pick you up? Maybe seven?"

"I'm actually in class until nine. That's not too late is it?" Manny couldn't believe that she was thinking it, as it was Professor McGugan's class that night, but she'd be willing to skip. For Matt Aspen, she'd skip a whole _day_ of class! She felt relieved when he shook his head no. "Good. Why don't I just meet you here, in front of the Wall?"

"Sounds like a plan." He shifted nervously, and for a moment she thought that he might be about to lean over and kiss her. Her skin went into gooseflesh at the very idea. He slowly straightened, trying to be polite. "I guess I'll see you tonight then."

"Yeah," Manny sighed, nodding as he walked away. Her grip on the locker behind her eased and she flopped against it, face warm. She sighed again, watching him leave. He was so adorable, so utterly perfect, so... so... so _Matt __Aspen_.

"Do ye fancy him, then?"

The voice, with the faintest touch of accent he allowed to slip out in public, made her jump. Distracted as she was watching Matt leave, she hadn't heard Joshua sneaking up on her--but then, she thought once her heart was under control, she never had. She turned around to find him standing behind her, a laptop bag slung over one shoulder.

"Whether I do or not, that's hardly any of your business," Manny snapped. To emphasize her point she slammed shut her locker. She caught sight of Matt down the hall turning to the sound. When he saw Joshua behind her, he began to walk back, but she waved him away with a pleasant smile. She didn't need Matt trying to defend her and getting his butt handed to him as a result.

"I don't know about that, lass."

Manny turned back to him, having been distracted by Matt turning the corner. "I'm sorry. What?"

"You said that it wasna any of my business if you liked him or not. I choose to think otherwise. I told you last night that I feel for you. Your welfare is my business, Manny, and if he has nefarious designs on you, then it's my business to protect ye."

She remembered what Heather had said: Joshua was there at night to protect her. She hadn't been lying then. Manny shrugged and grinned when she thought of Matt. "If he _does_ have nefarious designs on me, then I hope he uses them now rather than later."

"Ach, so you _do_ like him then!"

Manny blushed furiously and decided it was time to change the subject. "Speaking of last night, we're going to need to talk about it at some time."

"What about tonight?"

"No, not tonight. I'm going out with..." She nearly gestured in the direction that Matt had left in, or said his name, but then decided against it. Joshua didn't seem too fond of Matt, and even if he was, she saw no reason to give the old vampire a reason to tease her. "I'm going out with friends."

"Tomorrow night then?"

She sighed and nodded her head. "Tomorrow night." Tomorrow night she'd talk to him about how she was changing into a vampire and ask him to stop, or slow down exchanging blood. And tonight she would go out with Matt Aspen. It was perfect.

* * *

Manny walked out of class with a spring in her step that made Lacey grin. "Will you tell me now what's going on?" she asked. Manny had refused to tell her throughout class, making Lacey wonder what exactly it was that had put her friend into such good spirits.

"Matt Aspen asked me out!" She didn't announce it all at once, but rather word by word, resulting in a girlish giggle that Manny could not suppress. The resulting hug and cheer she and Lacey gave each other was precisely the reason why she had't wanted to say anything in class. "Can you believe it, Lacey? Matt Aspen and I, hitting the Wall together for a dance! I'm on my way there now."

"Oh ho! This dance is tonight, is it? Maybe I should run back home and grab Beth and Tanya so we can all be there as your very own personal cheering squad."

"Lacey! You wouldn't!"

She laughed. "Actually, I probably would. Does this mean that in your wild fantasies about Matt, you never thought of your roommates cheering you from the sidelines like in some romantic comedy?"

"No. I've always imagine the peanut gallery far away from me and Matt."

Lacey chucked her in the arm playfully. "Peanut gallery, are we? We just want to make sure that Matt knows he's taking our friend out and if he hurts her, he's going to have some very angry friends to deal with afterwards. And, should he run again next year for student president again, a _very_ tough smear campaign to overcome. So you'll be up late tonight?"

"Mmhm. Don't wait up for me. I don't know how late I'll be, but when I come home, if youre up I'll tell you all about it. If you're not, I just guess you're going to have to wait until the morning to hear all the juicy details."

She rolled her eyes. "Gee, thanks. You're positively incorrigible, you know that? Honestly, Matt Aspen is the only guy who can bring out this side of you," she grumbled, watching as Manny giggled again, eyes shining brightly. Lacey actually sneered. "Puppy dog love is positively disgusting. I'm starting to wish that the old, calm and rational Manny back."

Manouchka tilted her head and pouted. "Come on, Lacey. Be more happy for me? This is this is everything I've ever wanted!" She laughed loudly. "It's like the happiest day of my life! Anyway, tomorrow night I'm going to be out with Joshua again, so unless you catch me tomorrow morning, given classes and stuff, I don't know how much we'll see of each other."

Lacey's eyes gleamed, and her pert red mouth turned up in a cruel, teasing smile. Manny had never noticed it before, but shrugged the harsh lines of her face away. Lacey was a witch, she reminded herself, and good witch that she was, she still belonged to the same world as Joshua. It was a rougher, stranger, and darker world than Manny's, so Lacey was bound to take a perverse pride in teasing her.

_"Speaking_ of Joshua, how does he feel about Matt Aspen?"

"I don't know; why? Is he supposed to feel something?"

"Vampires have a tendency to be territorial, just like shifters. He might see you as his and might not like the idea of sharing you with someone else."

Manny shrugged indifferently, her jaw clenched at the very idea of it. She could certainly see the logic behind it. If vampires were supposed to think of people as pets, then there would be a certain amount of ownership tied to it, wouldn't there? This person was that person's pet, and that other person was another person's pet...

"Joshua doesn't treat me like that. He already knows that I'm going out with Matt tonight, and he didn't seem angry at all. He actually started teasing me, though he was worried that Matt was only after, like, sex or something. He termed it 'nefarious designs', whatever exactly that's supposed to mean..."

Lacey managed to smile at her. "I suppose it could be anything from sex to virgin sacrifices. I'm going to miss the bus if I stick around any longer. You're going to be okay? You don't want us there to cheer you on? Beth could totally use telepathy to plant suggestions in his mind for you."

"If Matt wants to kiss me, I want it to be because he actually _does_ want to kiss me; not because my roommate is putting thoughts into his head." Manny rolled her eyes at the very suggestion, but smiled at the idea. Then the picture of Matt kissing her turned into Joshua kissing her, and she forgot himself in the lightness of his touch, the gentleness with which he held her, and the simple undemanding nature of his lips. She pushed the picture away, repulsed. "Thanks for the offer though."

"Okay..." The way in which Lacey said it made her wonder for a moment if she didn't suspect the errant thoughts that had waltzed through Manny's head. Regardless, Lacey grinned--this time without the teasing edge--and waved goodbye as she ran off to catch the bus. "Have fun tonight! Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"

Manny laughed. "Reckless and wild, there wasn't much Lacey wouldnt do."

* * *

She hit her locker on the way to the Wall, tossing her books carelessly on top of her overnight bag. She was in a hurry to go and meet Matt. Then, nervous, Manny unlocked her locker again to dig around in her overnight bag. She'd hit the washrooms, make sure her hair was done and that she looked presentable, and _then_ she'd go see Matt.

Manny had just rounded the corner to the washroom when she saw them. It was a group of four men standing outside a classroom. The smallest of them had a few inches on Manny, and about twice her shoulder span. They were huge, hulking men. As if that wasn't frightening enough--four strange men standing between her and the washroom--the largest of them was wearing nothing but a pair of acid-wash jeans and a t-shirt. It was the t-shirt at which Manny was staring.

There was a black flower on it.

Her mind shot back to breakfast at Burger World with Ash. He'd drawn the flowers for her while they explained it to her. Which group identified themselves with foxglove?

_Shit._

The thought went through Manny's mind like a bolt. She stopped in her tracks, staring at the emblem on the shirt with renewed vigor, and fresh fear. Shapeshifters. The four burly men between her and the washroom were _shapeshifters_! And shapeshifters _ate_ people!

She tried to make herself move, but the urge to stand very still was overwhelming. She was scared, but some part of her mind remained rational. Prey reaction, Manny thought. When faced with a predator, the prey stands perfectly still in the hopes of avoiding detection. But that was for animals like deer. Humans used fright or flight. Where was that reaction?

The one with the foxglove t-shirt looked up and saw how Manny was staring at his shirt. Then he saw the way she was standing perfectly still, and he nudged his companions on either side of them. Manny had the strong impression of a pack of wild dogs staring at her, ears peaked, wondering whether to attack or not. She began to take a hesitant step back, realizing that the one who was now lifting his head in the air was catching her scent.

"She's terrified," he said to others in a low, deep voice. It wasn't low enough that Manny couldn't make out the words.

"She's human," said the smallest one, as if by counter argument.

The other small one, the one that wasn't wearing the foxglove t-shirt, smiled and revealed slightly yellowed teeth, too large for his face. "She knows."

Manny felt herself beginning to shake, and her muscles began moving of their own accord. She turned and began to run, thinking calmly: 'there's where the flight instinct is.' She could still hear the guttural voices of the shapeshifters cutting down the hallway, as surely as if they were right behind her.

"Kill her."

_The first rule of the Night World is never to let a human find out about it,_ Manny remembered Poppy saying. _If they do, then you kill them. The laws quite clear on that._

They weren't kidding. They really _were_ going to try to kill her!

She ran down the hallway, feet skidding on the floor in her panic. She struggled to get control over her own body, trying to get herself to run properly. This lurching pace that kept the world on crazy angles was only going to get her killed! But her body wasn't listening. It was running on its own, stumbling now and then over her own two feet. She skidded around the corner and screeched.

There was a _wolf_ down the corner. Snarling, it snapped yellowed fangs at her. Manny glanced over her shoulder to see three of the four men still coming down the hallway after her. She ran in the opposite direction, away from the werewolves. One of them most have gone down another corner to cut her off.

She realized belatedly which direction she was going in now. They were herding her towards the exit of the school. There were no other branches from this corridor. It was turn around and face the snarling wolf and the men, or run out the door into the open...

Into the open where there wouldn't be any security or passing teachers to help her. Into the open where there weren't any video cameras that could catch them changing shape or ripping her apart. Into the open where they could bury her body in the freezing ground when they were done with her.

Into the open where they could kill her.

And there was nothing she could do about it. She couldn't fight them. There was no one to help her. Breathing quickly already, she couldn't even find the breath to scream. They were going to kill her, and all she could do was hope that they wouldn't have too much fun playing with her before they did it.

She burst into the cold night air, and only the adrenaline pumping through her body kept her from being shocked by the plunging cold. Dark and covered in snow, the world was a winter wonderland, but Manny only worried about skidding on a patch of ice. She began heading for the townhouses, hoping to find shelter, when she heard the wolves howl behind her.

Glancing back, she found that all four of them had changed. Large, sleek beasts with thick grey-black fur, the sight of them was terrifying. They weren't just wolves, they were wolves with human intelligence and judging from the answering howl, they were calling for reinforcements.

They surged around her, cutting her off, and tugs at the hem of her shirt let her know that they were still herding her. She called out for help, her voice finally freed out of sheer desperation. A powerful fog of moving limbs and snapping teeth, they began herding her were they wanted her: into the forest behind the school. They were toying with her, raspy voices giving almost human chuckles at the way she shrieked when they leapt at her and pulled at her clothes.

Manny's gaze was drawn upward by movement at one window. Had someone heard her scream? She looked up hopefully and spotted Professor Heather McGugan at her office window, terror on her face as she watched the proceedings below, phone clutched in her hand.

Then the dark forest behind Nipissing swallowed her, leaving the wolves invisible, laughing monsters that taunted her deeper into the trees.

* * *

Joshua sat in the Wall, keeping a sharp lookout for a girl on which he could feed. Sitting on the second floor of the bar, he heard girls giggle and check him out, but the vapidity of their conversation made him cringe. At least when he fed off of the professor he could have a civil, intelligent conversation beforehand. The seat he'd chosen gave him the perfect view when a curly brunette walked into the bar... without Manny.

Matt Aspen circulated the first floor of the Wall, making small talk with those who approached him. Joshua could almost see why Manny like him. He was certainly charismatic. Still, he wondered, did Manny know that he was...

The cell phone in his pocket went off, disturbing him from his thoughts. He checked the display screen and relaxed a little. "Hello, lass. I see that you got the package I left for ye?"

"Yes," Heather said. He could tell from her tone of voice that she was smiling. "You're something else, Joshua. A human would have taken twice as long to get through this!"

"I had some free time last night."

Heather laughed, and Joshua wished he'd just come right out and admitted he had been unable to sleep last night. She knew him too well to be fooled by his cryptic remarks and offhanded answers. "Oh, Joshua! You... huh. Did you hear that?"

He rolled his eyes. "Heather, if I weren't what I am, the noise of this bar would keep me from hearing _you_."

"I thought I heard someone scream... oh Good Lord! Joshua!"

"What is it?" He pushed himself up from his seat, anger flaring from the fear he caught in her voice. "What's wrong?"

"Oh God," he could hear her ragged breathing through the phone. "It's _Manny_!"

* * *

The wolves pushed Manny until she could no longer run. Then they bit into her legs, sharp teeth piercing her flesh, making her cry out. She pushed herself up to her feet, numb to the sensation of blood running down her legs, to push herself a little bit more before she fell again. Wet, covered in melting snow and blood, the part of her mind that was self-aware had long ago retreated. Only the feeling of their teeth in her flesh brought it back, rousing it from the edge of exhaustion, to put just a little bit more room between the wolves and the university.

She fell again, sprawled out in the freshly fallen snow. She could feel twigs and branches, not yet buried, poke into the back, but they were hardly uncomfortable. She was too far gone to be uncomfortable. Her hands reached under her, searching for a stick for a weapon, and she felt her hands close around one, but she lacked the strength to lift it. The wolves surrounding her laughed at her.

One grabbed her shirt. She heard the weak fabric rip, exposing dark flesh raised with goosebumps. Another grabbed her pant leg and began tugging. She could not get up. They gave their tails the slightest wag, and then set in on her. Manny could see it happening from the corner of her eye. They went after her exposed stomach first. She closed her eyes to keep from seeing it happen and realized that she could feel nothing except the ground under her. She wasnt even cold anymore.

Hypothermia? She wondered. Maybe it was blood loss. Maybe it was both.

Either way, she didn't care what it was, only that she was glad she couldn't feel it as their teeth and fangs dug into her warm flesh. She did feel it when something warm closed about her neck. She could feel the saliva, burning hot, roll down her neck and under the hem of her shirt. She could feel the wolf above her pause, teeth barely scraping her neck. Whether it was out of guilt, a moment of remorse, or a perverse moment to enjoy the knowledge that her life was in his jaws, she didn't know or care.

She was just glad when that jaw tightened and descended, putting her out of her misery and fear.

* * *

The snow was falling gently in the air, and when they reached Joshua's hair, they clung there a moment before fading. He run through the woods at breakneck pace, dodging black limbs and invisible roots with supernatural speed. His reactions were faster than a human being's because he simply wasn't human.

He could hear the wolves feeding, and he only hoped that he wasn't going to be too late. He could hear the crunch of bones and smell the pungent, coppery smell of blood... there was so much of it!

Joshua burst into the scene and launched himself at the largest wolf he saw, pushing it off of Manny's still body. "_Get off of her_!" he bellowed, roaring it vocally and telepathically too. He sent the wolf flying into the nearest tree and then kicked at another, flinging it away from Manny's legs. His body was a weapon, dodging, spinning, kicking and pushing at anything that came near.

Despite being outnumbered, he was so brutal that the wolves eventually slunk away, disappearing one be one into the forest.

Joshua turned to Manny and a sob nearly racked his body. The damage was severe. There was no way she would survive... if she had already. Joshua leaned over her body, carefully tucking one arm under her shoulders, his large hand supporting her head as if she were a baby. Her eyes were still open, blind to the world, but he could tell her heart was still beating. He could actually see the veins still pumping in her neck, the blood squirting down her neck in a hot avalanche that steamed in the cool air.

There was no spunk, no light, behind her eyes. The body was still alive, but Manny was gone.

* * *

To be continued...


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

Four nights later, Manouchka woke up.

Her body felt strangely warm, her surroundings kind of fuzzy. She realized that she was in a bed, and thought it was strange for a bed to be in heaven. Then the pain set in. It was a kind of burning, itching pain, just under the skin. She shifted, trying to ease the feeling, but that only made it worse. Her stomach and her joints hurt when she moved.

It was when she was wondering why she'd feel pain in heaven that she came to the conclusion she was alive. Either she was alive, or she was in hell, and Manny was at least hoping it was the first. She opened her eyes and sat up, letting her eyes adjust to her surroundings.

She was laying in the guest bedroom in Joshua's house. She reached down, touching her stomach, and then touching her neck. She couldn't feel stitches, and minus the aching soreness in those areas, she felt fine. Manny pushed off the covers. She was wearing a large Oxford shirt--Joshua's shirt. She lifted it to see her stomach, expecting to see bandages or stitches.

The skin on her stomach was whole, minus several new scars. Pale, thin scars crossed her stomach. Manny's hazy mind came up with inappropriate examples of what they looked like, all of them terribly uinny in her confusion. They looked like a waffle iron, a tic-tac-toe board, the list went on. She began to wonder just how long she'd been recuperating for her wounds to have healed.

Although not vain by most standards, Manny's hand went again to her throat, delicately searching for the rough edges of scars. Were they there, too? Were there little silver lines along her throat from where the wolf had bit into it? She was too nervous to head to the adjoining washroom and check. Someone would tell her, if there were.

Upon getting out of bed she found that her legs were a little unsteady under her. Had they not been used for awhile? They certainly didn't look atrophied. She walked experimentally and found that each step hurt. It felt like her legs were asleep. She continued to walk, knowing that movement would help the blood flow and normality would return.

She maneuvered down the stairs and into the kitchen by herself. No one was coming to her side, telling her to return the bed. For one pained moment, Manny thought maybe they had forgotten about her.. or worse. Maybe she was a ghost, and the blood bond with Joshua would keep her locked in a condition of eternal torment until Joshua himself was dead!

Oh, that was a _horrible _thought!

'Maybe,' she thought rationally, 'everybody is out. Or asleep. It is nighttime.'

But in the kitchen she heard movement and caught a whiff of deodorant, perfume, and shampoo. Heather. She was cooking something. Manny could hear her puttering around the kitchen and she could smell brown sugar. 'Porridge,' she thought, sniffing the air. So it was dark outside because it was really early in the morning.

Her legs still sore and weak, she stumbled into the kitchen. The lights half-blinded her. She emerged blinking, shy in her nightshirt and feigning indifference. "Morning," she said.

Heather spun around and Manny saw her eyes widen in terror. The pitcher of milk she was using for her tea shattered on the ground. Manny could smell something sour and she wrinkled her nose, eyeing the milk seeping along the floor for signs of curdling. It certainly smelled bad.

"Manny! You're up!" There was a nervous stammer in Heather's voice that she couldn't remember hearing before. She moved to keep the island between them as Manny slid into her favorite chair. "I should have expected... he told me that you'd be up soon."

There was no point in asking who 'he' was. Joshua. Manny's mouth was watering. She picked up the spoon in the porridge and began pushing it around. "Did you make more? I'm famished. Please tell me that there's more breakfast."

Heather's pale face looked frightened, and then it turned into worry as Manny's movements became more agitated. "Manny, I really don't think that you should eat anything until Joshua comes back."

"Where did he go?"

"Out hunting." She gestured with her head out the back door, indicating the woods that the house shared with the university.

"How long was I unconscious for?"

"Three days."

Manny's eyebrows shot up so far they were lost in the thickness of her bangs. "Three _days_?"

Heather took a step forward towards the seat across from Manny, but then seemed to reconsider. Her face and tone were gentle. "Manny, how much do you remember of that night? Do you remember the attack? Do you remember how badly you were hurt? Do you remember Joshua?" It was yes to the first and second question, but Manny could not recall Joshua being there.

"Joshua wouldnt speak of it much, but he did tell me that he fought off the wolves. You were very badly hurt--too badly hurt for even the hospital to save you. Joshua did the only thing he could think of to save you." Manny stiffened, knowing that she was about to hear something horrible. Heather was drawing it out, giving her time to prepare, but Manny just wished she'd say it.

"He gave you his blood."

Oh... was that all? Manny felt relieved. "That's right," she agreed, nodding. "You had told me before that vampire blood is very strong. It keeps you from getting colds right? So he gave me his blood, and my body was able to fix itself?"

"Yes and no." Heather sighed, rubbing her head. "This would be so much easier if Joshua were here... that bastard."

Manny was rather shocked that she had heard Professor McGugan use such language. She didn't realize that as Heather stood in the kitchen, rubbing her temple, that her lips had never moved.

"It closed your wounds, but it didn't close them enough. Your injuries were beyond what it could heal. You you _died,_ Manny."

A chill went up her spine. "I _what?"_

"You died. The wounds were knitting together, but not quick enough to save you. Your heart stopped beating, and you stopped breathing, but his blood was still in ye. It kept working on healing you even after yer heart had stopped. Joshua brought you home and put you on that very kitchen table. Ach, he looked like a bloody ghost!" Her own face blanched, remembering what Manny had looked like lying on the slab of granite in the kitchen. "He wasn't sure for the first day, but when I came down the next morning, he told me that you were going to be okay. Sure enough, most of your wounds were all gone, but Bonnie Joshua looked like crap."

Manny could scarcely understand what Heather was saying from the emergence of her thick, nervous brogue, but she could imagine the scene in the kitchen table. It was beginning to dawn on her what Joshua had done, but accepting it was painful and terrifying. "Good God... His blood!"

She nodded, sadly, and slowly reached out for the first time to touch Manny's hand gently. "Aye, lass. His blood changed ye. Youre like _him_ now. A vampire."

_"No!"_ Manny jerked her hand away violently, leaping from her chair. "No! I'm not... I can't be!"

Heather's face softened. "Manny, go and look at yerself in the mirror. Ye kinnae undo it."

Manny tore from the room, running to the washroom wildly. When she saw her reflection in the mirror, she nearly screamed.

It wasn't her face looking back at her.

When she moved, she could see the old Manouchka there looking back at her, but otherwise the face in the mirror was not hers. The shape remained the same, but there was an innate quality in the eyes that made her look catty. They reminded her of Poppy's eyes. The eye color had changed too. She used to have light, milk chocolate-covered eyes. Now her eyes were caramel-gold. Her lips were fuller, and darker, and her skin was utterly flawless. She was beautiful in the mirror, like a statue of Nefertiti or some ancient goddess. She was predatory, graceful, and under her skin she could feel the rough edge of instinct that would allow her to survive in the Night World.

She stared at herself, fingers pressed against her cheeks. She could feel her skin, feel the pain in her skin from her hunger, and yet it didnt feel like her skin. Manny couldn't contain the scream anymore. It was building inside of her, as deep and bloody as if it had been waiting for her to realize she was no longer human. She shut her mouth, she closed her eyes, and _screamed_.

Her scream pierced the air and she heard the mirror crack and then shatter. She held it as long as she could and then stormed back down the hallway, all but flying to the kitchen. She was beautiful and deadly in her anger, the paintings and hangings decorating the hallway bashing against the walls as if in a maelstrom. Manny charged into the kitchen, not caring that Heather was cringing, terrified of her.

"Why did he do it? _Why did he do it? Why did he change me? Why didn't he let me die!?"_

"Would you prefer to be dead than alive?"

"I'd prefer being dead to being _this_!" She felt hot tears in her eyes, and she wanted to bawl, but the tears seemed stuck. Manny wondered if she could even manage to cry.

Heather looked away. "You'll have to ask him why he did it, but for what it's worth, I'm glad he saved you."

Her words fell on deaf ears. Manny's head shot up and whipped around to look at the back door. She could hear Joshua coming. She could hear his footfalls on the ground as he approached, the crunch of fresh snow under his feet, despite the fact that when she had been human his approach had been as silent as a ghost. Even stranger, she could _feel_ him coming. Some extra sense she had no name for told her that he was approaching, and that he was approaching with a good mood.

Only a few seconds later, Joshua walked into the kitchen, a smile on his face. It was a broad, cheeky smile, and for a moment he actually did look as though he could only be a teenager. The heavy weight that had given him his austerity had vanished. When he spotted Manny, his smile brightened and she noticed the color of his eyes. They were the impossible blue of a lightning strike. She also realized that he was holding a bunny rabbit.

"Manny! Youre awake!"

He sounded happy. Manny didn't really care. She leapt at him, aiming to slap his face, but he managed to dodge it.

"You _jerk_! You _jerk_! You turned me into a vampire!"

Joshua held the bunny aloft, using it as a shield. Manny grimaced, bearing sharp teeth. "I see that you found out about it."

"Found _out_ about it? _Look at me_!"

He slowly brought down the rabbit so that he could look at her, and she watched as his eyes changed from the brilliant lightning blue, to thundering grey, and then down deeper to sit on the edge of sapphire-amethyst. He was getting mad, but Manny was more confused by the array of colors she saw in his face. His eyes had always belied his feelings, once she knew which emotion caused each one, but she could not remember seeing so many of them. Had his eyes always changed through so many shades, or was it just that now her eyes were good enough to see them?

"Look at ye? I saw you when the werewolves were scaird away from ye! I saw ye neck cut open, ye blood on the snow, yer belly exposed! Dinnae stand there and tell me to look at ye! Yer alive, ain't ye?"

"I wish I were dead!"

She screamed the words, the window panes rattling in a gust of wind, and was shocked when he flinched, as though she had struck him. He recovered quickly. "If it weren't for me, lass, ye would be dead! Yer just hungry. We'll feed ye and then ye'll be right as rain."

Manny's stomach lurched at the idea, and she nearly gagged when she felt her mouth beginning to salivate. Blood. He was going to make her drink blood!

"I..."

"You're in pain, aren't you?" Joshua lost the thickness of his accent as his anger subdued. Manny's became inflamed as he spoke to her like she was a child who refused to eat her vegetables. "It's because you're dying, but not of starvation. You're drowning. Your blood can't carry oxygen. You need human blood for that, Manny. But I thought that since this _was_ forced upon you, you might not be ready for human blood. I brought you this instead."

He held up the rabbit.

Manny looked at him like he was mad. "You want me to drink blood from a _rabbit_?"

|Would you prefer drinking blood from a human?"

She thought about it for a moment, staring at the creature he held in his arms. It was actually a large hare, and it was terrified of being in the strange room. The only reason why it wasn't still fighting to break free of Joshua's hands was because it had learned it couldn't.

"Actually," Manny admitted, I would. Joshua's eyes bulged, staring at her in surprise. Manny gently took the bunny from Joshua, feeling it's racing pulse under her hand and hearing the heart pump away furiously. "This little guy's so small compared to a human being he wouldn't have enough blood to satiate my hunger. I'd kill him."

Joshua stared at her a moment, face unreadable. He then turned to look at Heather, stretching out a hand toward her pleadingly. "Heather is..."

"No, not Heather either," Manny cut him off sternly. "Lacey. I need Lacey."

"Lacey? Your roommate?"

She nodded stubbornly. "I'm hungry. I'm _real_ hungry, Joshua! But I don't want to kill anybodyor anything," she added, gesturing to the brown rabbit she held in her arms. "You can be really hungry and not kill Heather because she's been with you for so long. She's your friend. I don't have that, and there's nothing in me to stop me from hurting her. You might have to pull me off of her, and I don't want that. I don't want Heather to see me like that. But Lacey... Lacey is _my_ friend. I won't do _anything _to hurt her, and she won't think of less of me for seeing me like this. Besides, she's probably worried _sick_ because I doubt that either of you thought to call her and tell her that I was okay."

There was silence in the kitchen. Slowly, Heather raised her hand. "Um... I did. I just told her that you were sick and Joshua was looking after you and that he'd given you tranquilizers to keep you sedated because you were in pain."

Even Joshua looked surprised. "You did?" Heather nodded, and Joshua's response was a soft growl. "Heather, that was very stupid of you. What if Manny didnt make it? How would you explain that to Lacey?"

She didn't seem intimidated by his anger, but stood taller. "I would have thought of something. I thought it was better to let people know she wasn't missing than to have everyone organizing themselves into a search party for her. I'm sure you would have done something similar if youd have thought of something other than yourself over the last three days," Heather shot at him.

Manny didn't know how exactly how to interpret that comment, but it looked like a low blow, judging by Joshua's reaction. His eyes narrowed, but he turned away from her guiltily. Only Heather, Manny thought, could make him look chastised like that.

She reached out to him and took his hand, realizing that besides the kiss they had shared before the werewolves had attacked her, it was the first time that they had touched skin to skin. She saw his gaze lighten at the touch, and he lifted his head to see her.

"Please, Joshua. Take me to Lacey?"

He looked pained, as if her request was torturous. Joshua stared at the rabbit she held in her arms. He licked his lips slowly, nervously. "Okay," he finally agreed. "I'll take you to Lacey."

* * *

They were on the road within minutes. Manny changed into some spare clothes Heather had lent her and she let the bunny free in the kitchen. Heather seemed happy to sit with her breakfast and feed it lettuce, watching over it while Manny was away. The ride down to the school was silent, and that made it tense.

How would Lacey _really_ react when she saw what Manouchka had become? Manny trusted her friend to accept her, but would she be willing to give Manny her blood? Her stomach churned at the thought of blood, and her whole body gave a painful sigh of longing that made her mouth water. She needed blood, and if she didn't get it soon...

That Joshua didn't talk made her nervous. What had he been like while she was unconscious for three days? Had he visited her at all? Had he shut himself away on the third floor? Then she thought of something else: she'd missed her date with Matt Aspen.

The normality of the thought, the suddenness of it, made her want to burst into tears. Matt, adorable Matt, had probably thought she had stood him up. He probably hated her now. He probably would never want to talk to her again. She had everything she'd ever wanted right there in front of her, and now it was all lost because she'd taken a turn down the wrong hallway.

Another thought followed that one, but it was fuzzy and scary. She knew that there was something about being a vampire that hadn't clicked in yet, but she didn't know what it was; only that it was something scary. Unable to deal with it while she was so hungry, Manny ignored the thought and climbed out of the car.

Joshua had rescued her knapsack and she dug her house keys out of her bag, letting them into the residence. She stepped through the doorway without a problem and looked up at Joshua. "So, I don't need to be invited into a house to enter it?"

He shook his head no.

The elevator seemed to take forever. Manny shifted her weight back and forth uneasily, feeling the river of pinpricks through her veins. God, she was _hungry!_

She paused at the door to the apartment. It didn't feel right, using her keys in the lock, when she was coming to drink the blood of someone in the apartment. Manny hesitated knocking, and Joshua leaned around her to open the door for her. It was unlocked. Manny felt silly.

"Thanks."

Only a stiff inclination of his head acknowledged that he'd heard her. "Hello! Are you home, Lacey?"

The roommate in question emerged from her bedroom, rubbing her eyes and yawning. "What is it? Who's there?" She stumbled to the door, staring up at Joshua and scrutinizing him. With her sour expression and tousled red hair, Manny thought that she looked a little like a grumpy witch about to turn Joshua into a toad. "Joshua, is it? Yeah, you are pretty good looking, for a jerk. What the hell do you want?"

Then she noticed Manny standing nervously behind Joshua. Her eyes widened and she suddenly shot awake. Manny hated the fear she saw on her best friends face. "Manny? You... you're..." She turned back to Joshua, and glared at him furiously, her green eyes the color of jade and just as cold. She spoke in a hiss, careful not to wake up the other two roommates. "You _changed _her, you bloody bastard!"

His mouth tightened almost imperceptibly. "You know, if I thought that I would have kept getting that reaction, I would have drastically reconsidered trying to save her life."

"Save her..."

"After all," he continued, ignoring her attempt to interrupt him, "it's not like _I_ would have suffered if she had died."

"Died?" Lacey looked between them, confused. "Then this wasn't an accident? This wasn't you miscalculating bonding her to you and accidentally changing her?"

He straightened. "I think that I've done that enough times to avoid making amateur mistakes." Joshua pulled Manny forward and crowded them into the narrow hallway of the apartment. "Manny hasn't fed yet, Lacey. She was most insistent upon coming to see you for that."

Lacey looked like she perceived it as a threat, and Joshua's tone hadn't exactly helped. Manny jumped in. "I didn't mean it like that! I just look, Lace, I was worried that if I fed off of someone else, I wouldn't be able to stop feeding off of them. Joshua offered me a bunny rabbit, and then he offered me a human, but I'm... I'm _so_ hungry that I knew I wouldn't be able to stop drinking from them without hurting them. But _you_ can stop me if I try to take too much, and I _will_ stop because I would never want to hurt you!"

"Manny..." The name was a strange groan-sigh. Then Lacey slowly put her arm around Manouchka's shoulders and began leading her back to her bedroom. "This is really taking advantage of me, you know that? You _know_ I can't turn you away."

Joshua was following them, and when Lacey saw him from the corner of her vision she whirled around on him. "And just _where_ do you think you're going?"

"Following you. I need to show her how to feed properly."

Her superior tone of voice had a cruel edge. "I think that Manny can manage to figure it out on her own. Besides, this isn't my first time doing this. I can give her pointers almost as well as you can, and if she needs to take a few tries before she does it correctly, then I'll take that too. I'm not going to let you bite me, too."

She slammed her bedroom door in his face. That kept him from coming in, and it rather gave her a sense of satisfaction. Lacey's anger flowed away when she looked at Manny's strained face. She sighed. "I'm sorry, Manny. This is harder on you, after all. Come and sit down."

Both girls sat on the bed, and Lacey began to brush Manouchka's hair for her, fixing the disarrayed mess. Manny didn't even cringe at the feeling in her hair left from lying in a bed for three days. Manny sat numbly on the bed, letting Lacey brush her hair for her, feeling too hungry to do anything. The pain paralyzed her, and everything felt strangely fuzzy.

"Here. I'll make it easy for you." She demonstrated with exaggerated movements, rolling up the hem of her pajama top and holding up her wrist.

Manny blinked, and struggled to speak while Lacey dug around in her desk. Her tongue felt heavy in her mouth. "Aren't we supposed to drink from the neck? Joshua always went for my neck. Everything always goes for my neck," she shuddered, remembering the werewolves.

"Only if you want to be overly affectionate with me." Lacey grinned at her friend cheekily. "The neck is a good spot to drink, but its also very intimate. No offense, I love you, but I don't want your breath down my shirt. It kind of smells. Even vampires need to brush their teeth, unless you like your breath smelling like old blood. Besides, I'm not about to risk cutting my jugular."

Finding her Swiss Army Knife, Lacey sat back on the bed and held her wrist close to her face. Manny could see, with her new sight, a faint scar across Lacey's wrist. If she was human, she doubted that she ever would have seen it... and knew she hadn't.

"This isn't really your first time, is it?"

"Nope." She glanced up at Lacey. "There's been a few times where someone I loved was going to die without some blood and they weren't alive to bite me. It's a lot easier once you know how to bite, trust me."

Manny parted her lips. "I can learn."

"I know you can," Lacey said sweetly, "but at the moment, your fangs aren't even down. A fresh scent of blood and..." As she spoke, Lacey braced herself and brought the tip of her knife down across her wrist. She grunted with the effort and her hiss was so powerful that Manny wrapped her hand around her own wrist, wincing in sympathy. "And this should at least get them down."

The scent of human blood attacked Manny's senses furiously. She watched the blood well up on Lacey's wrist and her hands gripped the comforter on her bed to keep from lunging on her best friend. It pulled to her, called to her, like nothing ever had before. It wasn't normal hunger, it was water to a drowning man.

She licked her lips and her tongue passed over her fangs. It felt like running her finger of the edge of a knife. They had looked, on Joshua, to be a little dull, but now she realized just how sharp they really were.

And sensitive. They seemed to throb when her tongue brushed over them, and lengthen a little more. Manny ran the tip of her tongue down her left fang over and over again, coaxing it out further bit by bit, as she watched the pool of blood on Lacey's wrist turn into a drop that rolled along her skin.

Lacey held her wrist out for her, and Manny took it in her hands gently, bringing the wrist to her lips. She licked the blood, and found that it didn't taste bad at all. She knew from sticking cut fingers in her mouth that blood had a watery texture and a coppery taste to it that made it rather unpleasant. This wasn't bad. It tasted _good_: like water and chocolate and cherries all mixed together.

She began sucking on the wound, but stopped when she realized the arm she was holding was tensing up because of pain. Manny stopped, her tongue licking gently at the wound as she thought. She had gotten enough blood that the haze was lifted from her mind so that she could think about it rationally.

The blood couldn't get out of Lacey veins fast enough to ebb her thirst. She hadn't cut her wrist, Manny realized, just scratched the surface to spill some blood from the capillaries. Why? Because the scent of it had been enough to bring down her fangs.

She needed to bite where Lacey had cut herself, to make the wounds go deeper, and reach the blood. But the bite was always what Manny had fought. She didn't want to hurt Lacey... but she already _was_ hurting her!

In the confusion brought on by Manny's sudden moral dilemma, her body took over. Though they lacked finesse, her instincts knew that there was food just out of sight, and knew how to get at it. Her jaw bit down gently on Lacey's wrist, knowing that she could break the fragile bones therein if she bit too deeply or too hard. Lacey tensed and then shuddered with a sigh, and she felt their minds beginning to mingle.

The blood bursting into her mouth was sweeter than a breath of fresh air, cleaner than water, and she could feel Lacey's gladness at that.

"I dont taste bad?"

_No!_ She laughed as she drank, and her laugh was no longer a husky thing, but pure and strong. It too, had been changed, but Manny was too happy to notice. _It tastes delicious!_ _Did did I just use telepathy?_

"Uh-huh."

Manny remembered the way that Joshua's voice hurt her head. _Does it hurt?_

"Nope."

_Does... does me drinking hurt?_

Lacey actually laughed. "The bite hurts, but after that, it's actually quite pleasant. It would have to be for anyone to actually _want_ to give blood, now wouldn't it? And people do, you know." Manny's thoughts drifted to Heather McGugan. She didn't seem to mind giving blood to Joshua. "Do you feel my thoughts?"

_Yes._ Manny shut her eyes tightly and emptied out all the thoughts from her mind. Lacey's poured into her mind in their wake. She was thinking about growing up with Manny: how they had met, their first sleepover, the relief when Manouchka found out she was a witch and through all of them there was a feeling of infinite sadness that Manny couldn't understand. _It's not rude to look at them like this?_

"Did you mind when Joshua looked through yours?"

Manny lifted her lips, licking them fastidiously. It didn't seem to do anything, so she used the back of her hand. Her fangs were still down, and she couldn't figure out how to retract them. _Joshua's never seen my thoughts like that before. Whenever weve exchanged blood, I've been unconscious._

"What?"

"What I mean," Manny corrected, trying to calm down Lacey, "is that he's used telepathy to put my asleep. I... I was scared." She looked down at the wrist Lacey held. "Will it stop bleeding soon?"

"Yes, why? Are you still hungry?"

Manny smiled for her. "No. I think I could have kept going, but I'm satisfied now. I don't hurt anymore. I just don't want to see you hurt, and now you're walking around with a goddamn slashed wrist because I didn't know how to bite you properly." She reached out and gently touched Lacey's wrist. It was warm under her fingertips; alive.

It was that simple touch that made Manny burst into tears. Lacey was immediately holding her, asking her what was wrong, worrying she'd hurt her, but Manny was simply sobbing. When her tears managed to subside a little, she managed to get out everything off her chest, including the attacks from the werewolves.

"Look at what he _did_ to me, Lace! Look at what he _took_ from me! I need to drink people's _blood_ now! I can never grow up! I'll never get any fatter, or smaller, or taller! I'll never have children! I'm... I'm goddamn Peter Pan, and I never asked for it! I'm trapped in Neverneverland and I wish I were dead! I wish that he had let me die! I never asked to be saved! I want to be human again!"

She sobbed and wailed until she had nothing left to give. Manouchka felt a little consoled by the fact that she could indeed cry tears, and by the time she'd gotten all of them out, Lacey's wound had even stopped bleeding. The girls lay together on the bed, arms and legs entwined, and Manny's tear stains dotted Lacey's pajama top like little rain drops.

"No force on earth, heaven, or hell," Lacey said gently, "can make you human again. You're just going to have to accept that, but you know that you still have me. He could have changed you into a big, glutinous blob of Jell-O and you'd still have me. I love you."

Manny hugged her friend tightly. "I love you too, Lacey."

When the two girls finally emerged from the bedroom, they found Joshua outside waiting for them. He had slumped down against the wall opposite Lacey's room, and sat with his legs folded to his chest. Joshua looked up at them, and his expression was bitter. They lingered on Manny, making her feel suddenly very sheepish.

"Come on," he growled, "let's get out of here before your other roommates wake up."

* * *

This time the silence in the car was angry as they drove back to Joshua's. Manny wasn't entirely certain how she knew that he was using silence against her, as opposed to being at a loss of what to say, except that the violet haze that covered deep blue eyes was a good indication of his anger. He had dragged her out of the apartment and she'd protested. Her home was here, but he refused to let her stay. Eventually Lacey had suggested that she go with him, and Manny consented to being led to the car. He threw in a duffle bag he hadn't had before in the back seat.

"That's my duffle bag!" Manny had exclaimed.

"I know. I packed a few things for you."

"You went through my bedroom while I was with Lacey?" He nodded stiffly. "Why?!"

That was when the initial silence had started. Joshua turned on the blinker for the driveway, and then at the last moment shut it off and pulled an illegal U-turn. Manny's head connected with the passenger seat window pane, but he didn't apologize. She rubbed her head. "Where are we going?"

"Someplace where Heather can't hear us talk." The hands that gripped the steering wheel were white-knuckled. "I feel like yelling."

Manny let Joshua drive wherever he was intent on going. There wasn't much she could think of to stop him; talking to him rationally certainly wasn't going to do any good. They drove, in silence again, for the better part of an hour, up the north highway. Manny felt like they were halfway to the next major city when Joshua pulled into a picnic area on the side of the road. With the half a meter of snow that had fallen over the last three days, the area was deserted. He climbed out of the car and motioned for Manny to do the same.

They both stood there in nothing more than heavy sweaters, immune to the cold, letting the wind whip their hair and clothes around until Joshua was ready to speak. When he was, he turned around and looked at her.

"Look, for whatever its worth, I'm sorry that youre like me now, but I _can't_ be sorry that I changed you!"

Manny wondered where this apology was coming from. "You... you _heard_ me in there talking with Lacey!"

"Of course I did, Manny! I'm a _vampire_! Better than human hearing, remember? I heard everything you sobbingly told her! I said I was sorry, but the fact of the matter is, there were worse things that would have happened to you than dying, Manny!"

She felt tears sting her eyes and turned to face into the wind. If they fell again, she could blame them on the cold. "What could possibly be worse than being this, Joshua? What's worse than being a vampire?"

He marched around the car, advancing on her slowly. Manny had to steel herself to keep from moving from that spot to try and stand up to him. His eyes were stormy grey, and only that kept her from being afraid he'd lash out at her. He was angry, but in control of himself. "Have you ever seen zombie movies, Manny? Vampires and witches aren't the only movie creature that's real. Do you know why zombies are the living dead? Why they crawl out of their graves? Because they're humans who were going to be vampires, but didn't make the transition! If the vampire blood isn't strong enough when you die, then you're body can't complete the transformation and you wake up a mindless ghoul!"

Joshua could see the news startled her. He pressed on, trying to drive his point home. He stood so close to her that when she breathed he could feel her breath, only slightly warmer than the winter chill, on his neck. "You got to wake up in a cozy bed among friends. If I had left you in the woods to die, you would have woken up mindless, alone, hungry for blood, and with your intestines hanging out of your body!"

The tears ran down her cheeks. "That's a lie!"

"Why would I have to lie to you?" he roared, arms outstretched. "I had nothing to gain from getting you turned into a zombie! I had nothing to gain from saving you! And I did, Manny! I _did_! I saved you!"

Manny stared at him, and then slowly lifted her hand to dry her cheeks. She sniffled. "But then why?"

Joshua froze, and the emotion fled from his face. His eyes returned to their normal color, his lips parted softly, and he once again looked nothing more than a normal teenage boy... one that was shocked and completely defenseless. He had been so busy trying to impress upon Manouchka the fact that he had no logic behind his actions, he had opened himself to the question of why he had bothered to save her in the first place.

Manny repeated the question for him, her inquisitive voice soft. "Why did you save me then, Joshua?"

"Because," he replied, just as quietly, "I couldn't risk letting you turn into a zombie. It didn't have anything to do with you being a threat to the way I live my life, but just that that you're a person, a good hearted one, and I couldn't let you be turned into a monster."

Her face flooded with warmth. She reached out and put her hand on his arm. "Joshua... that's the kindest thing you've ever said to me."

Ignoring the hand on his arm, he continued looking down at her without even seeing her. His eyes were brilliant blue, the color of lightning in the dark, and Manny found herself again wondering if the color had always been there, or if she had only begun to see it.

"I was so worried that you wouldn't wake up," he admitted, staring past her. "There's an age limit for these things. Bodies over the age of seventeen don't always make the transition. There was still a good chance that you wouldn't be able to change into a vampire, but at least then you would have been dead. You wouldn't have been a zombie, just a corpse. So I bled myself, every morning and night and noon, and gave you my blood. I think that might have helped, because you made it."

Manny recalled Heather's comment about Joshua thinking solely of himself. Her expression softened. "You... you weren't thinking of yourself, were you? Bleeding yourself like that... you might heal fast as a vampire, but you couldn't have replenished the blood fast enough."

A ghostly smile lit upon his expressions. "No, no I couldn't. Whenever I wasn't with you, I was off hunting trying to regain my strength."

"Whenever you weren't with me? How often were you with me?"

"Quite often. I was..."

He let the thought trail off, and didn't pick it up again. Manny leaned closer to him, arching an eyebrow. "Worried?" Joshua nodded stiffly, the movement so slight that the snowflakes stuck in his hair failed to fall off. "You don't usually worry much, do you?"

"No. I normally don't. Normally I don't care."

"Why was this different?"

Joshua's calm annoyance broke, his face tightening again, and his voice was a roar, even in the wind. "Why do you have to ask? Why do you care?"

Manny jumped back, surprised. "I'm just trying to understand."

"Understand what?" he snarled, lip curled to reveal a hint of fang.

"Well _you_, of course."

He stared at her. Then, slowly, the ghostly smile was back. He shook his head, and reached out to take Manny into his arms. He pulled her to him and she didn't resist, and his arms wrapped around her tightly. She found herself snuggling in closer, her cheek pressed against his shirt, and with her new sense of touch she could feel how thin and worn it was.

"Manny, my blood made you into a vampire. No one else could understand me like you do." He stopped talking verbally and switched to telepathy. This time, there was no pain or feeling of intrusion. His voice seemed to belong there, filling a part of her mind that had been waiting for him. _No one else has the right to understand me. But I don't understand it myself. I just I saw you there, and I knew that I couldn't let you turn into a ghoul, but I couldn't let you die either. I just kept thinking that it would be a horrible waste of life, to lose someone who had barely begun to live._

Manny felt her face flush, and she was relieved. She was a vampire, but she was still human enough to blush. The words warmed her, and she snuggled deeper into the worn fleece of his sweater.

_I think... well, thank you for not letting me turn into a ghoul._

_But not 'thank you for saving my life'?_

_No... not _yet,she added, trying to give him some hope, _but maybe someday, when I get used to being a vampire._

Manny thought of something else then and she looked up at him, pulling away from the relaxed hug they had been sharing. His face was happy, but when he saw her expression, he became worried. Manny thought it odd, but then reminded herself: his blood beat in her veins.

He no longer scared her. He was softer, somehow. He was still prickly, but Manouchka was instantly reminded of a porcupine. Joshua was a porcupine. He was prickly and uncomfortable and enjoyed being alone, but when you were close enough to him, you realized that between all the prickly parts, there was soft fur.

She was close to him now because of their blood. There was a moment of panic in Manny, and Joshua felt it, his shoulders stiffening as he prepared to meet some threat. Manny pressed a hand to his shoulder, telling him it was okay, and he relaxed. _I just realized that Professor McGugan is no longer your only weak spot. I just realized that were close now. _

_And that worries you?_

_Well, when I first met you, _she said slowly, _I hardly thought that I would be able to calm you down like this when you became upset._ Her caramel-colored eyes lingered on the hand laying on his shoulder, and so did his. Manny gulped nervously and slipped from using telepathy. "I wouldn't be able to calm you down like this if you didn't let me. That worries me, too."

Joshua answered her with silence, before he tentatively prompted her. "And?"

"And... and I guess that it makes us friends."

"The proper term is 'sire'," he corrected stiffly, in the ice-cold voice he used when he was being defensive. Then the smallest ghost of a smile turned up one corner of his mouth. "But I think I like friend."

"Good!" Manny leaned back and folded her arms over her chest with a smug smile. "Now then, if you're done being a prickly porcupine, I would like to go back home and get ready for school. I've been missing for three days. I'll have lots of work to catch up on, and I need to find Matt. He must have been so hurt that I didn't call and cancel our date."

The life that had just softened Joshua's angular face from haunting beauty to refreshingly normal vanished, until all that remained was the frigid anger she had become accustomed to seeing from the man that had set out to scare her. "Manny, you can't go back to school."

"Why not?"

"Because."

"It's not like I'm dead, Joshua." His name came clearly from her bee-stung lips, slowly enunciated. Joshua bristled with anger. He knew the tone was meant to insinuate that he was stupid. "So I won't grow up? At the very least I can finish going to school and get my degree."

He was silent. His eyes bore into hers with the iron strength that had kept Joshua living for so long. Manny felt her knees shake a little against that determination that she not go to school.

When he saw she wasn't blabbering on about how she needed to go to school, Joshua continued. His voice had turned soothing, soft and clearly with the faint hint of his accent, and his eyes were still steely grey.

"You're part of a new world now, Manny. There are new rules that you have to learn. The first rule of the Night World is..."

"Never let the humans find out that you exist."

Joshua arched an eyebrow, and the cold November wind teased his hair. "Ah, yes. I forgot ye already knew the rules. The second rule is never fall in love with a human. Doing so tends to lead to the breaking of the first rule, ye see. And besides, humans don't like it much when others of their kind fall in love with cattle and the same goes for vampires."

"But what does that have to do with me?" She suddenly panicked, wondering if Joshua knew about her crush on Matt Aspen. Was he trying to suggest that she would reveal herself to him? He turned and stared at her, until she stopped thinking about Matt and began thinking with her head.

He was telling her the rules because she was a vampire now. These rules bound her now. Despite how she felt about Matt, she wasn't in love with him, so why would she risk anything by telling him she was a vampire? Vampire. She wasn't going to tell Matt anything, but what about her family? They would notice that she wasn't going to be aging. She lifted her head, eyes bright against her dark skin in the morning light, and Joshua nodded.

"Eventually," she slowly said, interrupting him as she caught him off guard. Manny's voice strengthened. "I'd _eventually_ have to stop going to school, and I'd _eventually _have to do something about my family, but not immediately! I mean, it's not like you changed me at twelve, Joshua. I'm not going to be going to go through puberty or grow any taller. They wouldn't notice anything at all at first!"

"Yo'uve seen what you looked like in the mirror. You've changed on the outside."

"My parents haven't seen me in months. I can use contacts to change my eye color, and the skin could have easily been cleared up by going on some... new... makeup stuff."

They stared at each other. Manny put her hands on her hips and he crossed his arms sternly.

"You need to stay at home."

"I'm not going to become a prisoner in your house!"

"You're putting your life on the line!"

"It's _my_ life to put on the line!"

His eyes bled into amethyst. "I didn't get to be this old by needlessly putting my life on the line. You're on the fast track to destroying yourself and ruining a secret we've kept for eons."

Manny held his gaze for a moment longer and then lifted her chin a half an inch higher. Turning, she walked away from him. If he wanted her to stay in the house, then he was going to have to keep her there by force. Manouchka hadn't fought to get into university to have it ruined just because of a little mishap with some werewolves.

She had classes to attend.

Joshua stared after her, watching her walk away. He knew that he should stop her, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. Manny was a smart girl, if stubborn. She'd soon come to realize that he was right.

At least, he hoped she realized that soon, before anything happened.

* * *

To be continued...

Sorry this took me so long to update. When I got a note to continue it, I began posting it immediately, but then getting called int work put it off for another 10 hours. Hopefully I won't get distracted by real life and I will get on updating chapter 11 soon.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

Matthias Aspen was sitting in class, barely listening to what the teacher was saying. He was bored out his mind, and every once in awhile, his eyes would slowly roll over to the empty seat beside the red head. Lacey What's-her-name. Where was her little friend Manny? She hadn't shown up for their date.

He hadn't minded much. When it became clear she was a no-show and not just running behind, he found a few new girls to flirt with. A smile caressed his lips when he thought of the fun he had had at the Wall.

The door shut from the top of the lecture hall, and Matt glanced back with the rest of the students. A low murmur went through the boys of the class. Matt could hear the whispers, and he agreed with them. It was Manouchka walking in, and she looked good.

There seemed to be a glow of vitality that lit her from within as she sat beside Lacey in her normal seat. Her skin was perfectly smoothed and moved subtly in the dim lights of the hall, reminding Matthias of panther fur. Her eyes, when she scanned the crowd and looked for him, turned gold for a moment when the lights hit them properly. The breath caught in Matt's throat when she spotted him and smiled. Then she tentatively raised her hand to give him a small wave.

Matt returned the wave and then leaned forward in his seat, resting his elbow on his knee. Wow… she'd disappeared for three days and come back stunning. He had to do something about this before someone else noticed and took advantage of it.

* * *

He found her after class by her lockers. She still smelled strongly of her shampoo. No wonder she had been late for class. She'd only recently showered.

Manouchka heard him approaching and lifted her head to see him coming down the hallway. She smiled and her teeth were brilliant against her dark skin. Her voice, too, was different. It sounded… older. And prettier. "Hello, Matt."

"Hi, Manny."

She shut her locker door, jacket in her arms. He noticed and jumped the gun. "I'm about to leave, too. Unless you were going to meet Lacey, did you want a ride?"

"You're not upset with me for missing our date?" She shifted her weight uncomfortably. "I was… That is… I'm sorry, Matt. I don't have an excuse for why I wasn't there. Something came up."

"I understand. I just wish that you would have called and told me that you weren't going to be able to make it." She mumbled something, and Matthias thought it sounded like 'If I had been able to call, I would have'. There was a hint of laughter in the tone. "Don't worry. I'm not really upset. I'm sure that you had a good reason for it. It isn't my first time being stood up."

It _had_ been the first time he had ever been stood up, but the lie reassured Manny. She breathed out, exhaling and relaxing. Her smile widened for him, and she looked up at him softly, with a hint of hunger about her. She wasn't quite as sweet and innocent as he had first thought she was.

He ran his hand through his hair, feigning nervousness. He couldn't pull his eyes away from her, and he felt warmth spreading through her. Matt was attracted to her; there was no argument about that.

"What about that ride?" he inquired shyly, nudging her leg with a gentle foot.

Manny jumped out of her dreamy-eyed stare. Her smile was so wide it revealed even white teeth, some of which were a little too sharp to look like a friendly smile. "I'd love one."

Matthias offered her his arm, which she took eagerly, and they fell in stride with one another. She sighed quietly beside him. It was so soft, so faint—like the sound of a child falling asleep. He glanced down at her to find that her eyes were still open and her back was straight. She looked… she looked regal on his arm. Manny noticed him looking and smiled at him.

"I appreciate the ride home."

"Don't worry about it."

Matthias' car was sleek and new. Manny felt like everyone in the parking lot was watching when he opened the car door for her and she slid inside. She'd always wondered if it would make her feel nervous, but it didn't. Knowing that everyone was watching her, envious of the gorgeous man on her arm and her ride home in the cold November weather made her feel _good_. It wasn't Matthias that made her stand taller, it was pride.

The old Manny that wasn't gorgeous and powerful would have been overwhelmed. The new Manny, with her caramel eyes and sultry expressions, embraced it. She glanced out the window to the bus stop as Matthias climbed into the car. Her tongue licked her lips quickly. She could have any of them. She could have any of the little fawns waiting the bus, just by going up to them and luring them some place secluded. They were full of blood, and they wouldn't miss it when she bit into them…

Immediately, she squashed the thought flat and sternly slumped in her chair, facing forward. That was her new nature talking, she reminded herself, not her. Becoming a vampire would only alter _who_ she was if she let it. She was _not_ going to begin hunting people. She would feed off of donours, and that was _it_.

"Did you see everyone watching you?" Matt laughed. The key was in the ignition, but he wasn't starting it.

"Yes."

"Every one of them was jealous of us."

"I don't want them to be jealous of me," she admitted bitterly, thinking of the attack from the werewolves. What Manny had was a string of bad luck. She wouldn't curse that on anybody, even if she did have enough good luck to survive it too.

"I was jealous of you."

His words lifted her head. He was staring at her softly. God, he was beautiful. Manny wondered how many art students asked him to model for them. She felt her face grow warm. "Why… why in the world would you be jealous of me?"

He smirked, revealing the dimple. Her heart thumped uncomfortably, and for a moment she remembered Joshua. He didn't have a dimple, and seeing him smile was still enough for that uncomfortable heart-thump. His smile was a rare treasure; Matt's was beautiful, but frequent.

"Well, I suppose I really mean to say that you made me jealous. You make me jealous right now, Manny, because I look over at you, and I know… I know that you missed our date because someone else was making you into a vampire."

Manny froze, half-inclined towards that delicious dimple as she was.

He reached over, and Manny tried to move, but she couldn't. She was too scared. Her fingertips tingled and she began inching her hand toward the handle of the door when she heard him press the lock. _Click!_ His fingers cupped her cheek gently, lifting her head. Her eyes stared up into his, frightened and large.

"Did they tell you when they did it that it's against our laws? Did they tell you the penalty if we caught you trying to become one of us?" Manny searched his face, and then her eyes le[t travelling down the length of his body. Where was his flower? Why didn't he have a flower!? Then Matt smiled, and this time it went beyond his cultivated dimple to reveal fangs. Manny heard an 'eep' and realized belatedly that it was from her. "You should have listened."

Manny realized that she should have. Her family might not have known the difference, but the Night Worlders living silently around her would notice it. She thought of the pack of werewolves—god, she was a stubborn fool sometimes! Of course _they_ would have known that she would have changed! Maybe she was lucky that it was Matt that had found her, but there was something about that smile…

"Who changed you, Manny?"

The question was so sweet for a moment she didn't register the pain that came with telepathy. She wanted to tell him, Matt of the pretty dimple, and she actually opened her mouth before she regained control. She jerked back from him, pressing her back against the door of the vehicle, hands over her mouth to keep from answering. She _couldn't_ tell him! She had to protect Joshua!

_Protect?_ She almost burst out laughing. It wasn't that long ago she was trying to put him in jail!

Heather, then. She had to protect Heather.

Matt frowned. He didn't look so handsome when he frowned. He leaned forward in the car. "Who changed you, Manouchka?"

The question was both telepathic and vocal. Manny's hand tightened around her mouth when the pain burst into her head and she threatened to whimper. Still, she managed to keep her mouth closed, and cursed the fact that she wasn't strong enough to get help.

"Fine," he snarled, his hands still gentle on her skin, even as his voice cut her. "_Sleep_, then."

Firey spokes stabbed into her skull, making her vision turn white for a second. It was worse than Joshua's telepathy; a thousand times worse. Joshua's voice was strong, but it approached like the tide. The pain came from resisting his wishes, from fighting against the physical pull to give in to what the voice said. Matthias' voice was strong, but it wasn't as old. He used the pain as a whip enforce his commands.

"You have a natural resistance," he said, surprised enough that his jaw fell slack. "It's no doubt stronger now that you're a vampire."

He tried again, and this time, it was the pain that made her pass out, not the order. Matthias was too young to know the difference, and didn't care much either way. Leaning over, he buckled her in, and then started the car.

* * *

Manny realized that she was tied into a chair. Her shoulders ached and her wrists felt chafed. The pain and cramping eased up a little when she sat upright in her chair, but she didn't open her eyes yet. She listened first, trying to prepare herself for what she might find.

There were voices above her, muffled. She was tied into a wooden chair. She pulled gingerly at the ropes that bound her arms behind the back of the chair, and found that even with her new vampire strength, she could not break the ropes. In fact, the ropes burned her as she pulled at them, sending the fibers scratching against her skin in painful welts. She seemed to be in a basement, judging from the cold damp—near freezing, actually, but the cold didn't seem to bother her as much now that she was a vampire—and the creaky noises above her. The room was pitch black, but she could make out small windows close to the ceiling that let in scant moonlight bounced into the room off of the layers of snow outside.

How long had she been missing?

"I have her downstairs, father." Manouchka could hear the voices now that she was concentrating on them. "Someone's changed her!"

"Are you sure, boy? She could have been one from the very beginning. I'm not going to stick my neck out if it turns out that she was one of them lost lamia that keeps turning up."

"Father, will you quit talking like some backwards yokel? Damnit. I know the difference between a human and vampire! Especially a made vampire!"

There was a guttural 'harrumph'. "Well, you certainly do sleep with enough of each. If I go down there and find out that she's not a newly made vampire, I'll tan your hide, boy."

Footsteps drew close, passed over head, and then headed away. There was the sound of a door unlocking and then bright light suddenly rushed in from upstairs. It blinded Manny, and she nearly gasped in pain when the lights flicked on in the basement. She ducked her head down as low as she could to keep the light away until her eyes could adjust.

Fingers grabbed her short cropped hair and pulled her head up before she could adjust. The light blinded her, and someone swore. His breath stank of blood and ale—a little bit more heavily on the blood.

"I'll be damned. She's fresh all right. Do you have any idea who made her?"

Matt's voice answered the man. "I would have thought her roommate. They were always so chummy, you know? But her roommate's just a witch. She couldn't do this, and I don't think that they have a vampire friend willing to change her."

Matt's father, she realized, as the basement came into focus. It was strange being held prisoner in such a normal looking basement. A washer and dryer sat in the corner, old and avocado green, with a load of laundry sitting atop, waiting to be put inside the washer. Another corner held tools, hanging from the wall, and a hand-made work bench. Stacks of Rubbermaid and boxes filled the other corners, labelled 'decorations' and 'old toys'.

The vampire standing in front of her, despite his breath, was just as handsome as his son. Bright blue eyes contrasted darkly against the pitch black eyelashes, the dark blonde eyebrows perfectly framed on his face by hair just a few shades lighter. Healthy, all-American vampire. That was Matt's father.

And Manny was terrified of him.

She couldn't defend herself against him, tied in her chair. He was strong and furious. Manny could feel his anger radiating off of him. Night World law had been broken, and he was honestly angered at it. She supposed that he was allowed to be angry, but it hadn't been her choice to break it, so Manny felt that he had no right being angry at her.

"Who did this to you?" he growled.

She wanted to tell him. Manny was scared and sick and tired of this new world, where cute boys tied her into chairs and their father interrogated her, and where the victim of a crime is tortured into revealing who sired them. Except that she couldn't turn him in. Joshua had committed a crime, she was the victim, and she could not turn him in. She hated being a vampire, but he had saved her _life_…

"_Who_ did this to you?" The growl was louder this time, more insistent, and when she remained silent he grabbed her chin and forced her to look up at him. Matt's father had the same healthy blue eyes, but his were as cold as ice. Even when he turned to look at his son, they didn't warm. "Matthias, is she dumb?"

Matthias. The name sounded foreign to Manny. She'd always assumed that Matt had stood for Matthew—but apparently that was too human for a lamia boy.

"No, Father, just stubborn. Manny's actually really quite smart." Matt was looking at her, and from the corner of her eye she could see his expression change, becoming insistent and pleading. He had wanted to bring her in, wanted to see justice being levied out, but he hadn't expected him to come home and have his father bind her into a chair and begin interrogating her. "I would have thought that she'd be smart enough to give him in so that we don't have to hurt her."

Manny felt a chill settle through her body at his words. If she didn't give up Joshua, they'd hurt her to get the information. Judging from the blasé way Matthias had let the information slip, hurting her to get what they wanted wasn't going to be a big concern for them.

Mr. Aspen's fingertips were pressing so hard into her skin she could feel her skin beginning to bruise. He repeated the question for a third time, this time using the slightest hint of telepathic suggestion to try and coax her into telling him. Manny knew that if she wasn't a vampire, if she wasn't resistant to it, she'd be squirming to tell the handsome, older man in front of her. Instead, she felt hot embers dig into her mind and slice and pull, trying to drag the name out of her deepest thoughts.

She squirmed uncomfortably in the chair, her wrists chafing, and she spat at Mr. Aspen. Her saliva landed on his shirt collar. His lip curled up in disgust.

"She's resistant, Dad. I had to use up a lot of energy just getting her to fall asleep in the car."

"You're younger than I am, son. I expect it would take more energy from you. I can get the information out of her." He sounded fanatic, and Manny screamed when he stopped using verbal commands and switched to telepathy entirely.

She collapsed in the chair, sweating and breathing heavily. God, that had _sucked_. And it had _hurt_ too. Joshua had unintentionally hurt her with telepathy, but Mr. Aspen was using it like a weapon, purposely seeking out weaker spots in her mental armor and driving his own thoughts into her mind like a wedge, trying to pry her mind open with each fiery jab of his mental crowbar.

She really didn't want him to do that again.

"Give us a name," he crooned.

Joshua's face floated to the surface of her memories. She remembered the way he smelled, the way he held her so gently when he was going to bite her, the way his accent thickened when she pressed his buttons until she had him infuriated and he switched entirely to Gaelic. Gaelic made her think of Heather, and she wondered: if something happened to Joshua, what would they do to Professor McGugan? It wasn't just Joshua she had to protect, but his allies as well, who would surely be found out if an investigation looked into Joshua and his unorthodox way of finding reliable sources of blood.

She drew up all the pride she could muster in her little body. Manouchka didn't even know if her plan would work, but she had to think of something, and this response came naturally. Using her pride, she buried all her memories of Joshua and the Professor behind the thick wall of pride, solidified the wall with memories of her family and friends the love they had for her, hid the core of herself behind it, and then faced Mr. Aspen, knowing that bits of her were about to be shredded apart under his telepathy.

She would give him memories she could afford to let him see—dodgeball games in elementary school and boring high school presentations and movies—while the precious memories and the names and faces of the people she needed to protect would remain behind the shield.

Mr. Aspen turned to look at his son. "She's trying to protect him. Someone must have seen her the last night she was human. Alert them that someone's changing humans. That will draw out the Night Worlders who are loyal to us, and they will help use weave a net through the city. Soon we'll know which ones are loyal to the Council, and which ones are Daybreak sympathizers. North Bay needs to be cleansed so that our secret can be kept."

"I'll get right on it, Dad."

Matt's footsteps retreated on the stairs, going back upstairs, leaving Manny alone with the blue-eyed vampire. He sighed and released her face.

"Allow me to explain something to you about telepathy. There are lots of factors to determine how strong a vampire is: how often do you drink? Is it human blood, or do you live off of pigs and other wildlife? How old of a vampire are you? How strong is your body to deal with the power inside of it? I drink only human blood, and I am _very_ well fed. You're new, so even if you had had human blood, you've only had a day of it, while I've lived for years on it. No amount of shielding can hold me back—getting the information out of you will only be a matter of time, and how badly damaged I injure you before you give it up. Save me the time and effort and save yourself the pain."

"Go to hell. In fact, go to hell in a handbasket."

He smiled. "The fun answer, I see. Either you're brave, or quite foolish. I think the latter, unfortunately," he said, straightening and fixing his tie.

From out of his back pocket, he withdrew a book of matches. There was a sharp his and the smell of burning wood that reminded Manny of birthday parties. He held up the match, close to the end of his bulbous nose—that seemed to make him look like a harmless teddy bear until his smile revealed sharp canines—and watched the flame fizzle and hiss.

"Did you know," Matt's father asked in the voice of a man used to giving lectures, "that fire is the one thing that can hurt everybody? Human, witch, shapeshifter, and vampire alike, when flame hits your skin, it hurts like a bitch." Then he placed the match gently on her arm, and stood back to watch her writhe as the fire continued to burn away, ripping out another match for when the first expired.

* * *

Matt had to move through the university cautiously. He passed by groups and smiled the dimple-revealing smile, made polite conversation and even managed to score a few phone numbers, but working through the Night World circles was a slow process. He knew that Manny's roommates had friends on campus, who would gather their attention once they found out that he was asking about Manny. So Matt began working on his own circle of friends first, and then they spread out.

Getting a picture of Manny was easy. Then it was just a matter of asking people when they had last seen the girl. Most students had heard that a girl had gone missing, few had known she had showed up for her one class that day, and fewer knew that she had been changed into a vampire in the three days she had been missing.

Showing her picture to a gang of wolves, he mentioned this fact, and the lead alpha of the pack arched an eyebrow in surprise. He smelled heavily of tobacco, and Matthias wondered how someone with their senses could stand to smoke something so heavy. He took the picture from her.

"No kidding? She was human when we saw her."

"When did you last see her?" The question was old. Everyone else had just shrugged, handed back the picture and said, "around" or "here or there" or had her confused with some other human girl waiting at the bus stop.

"The night she disappeared. She knew what we were, man." Matt lifted his head in interest, blue eyes shining. "We were in the hallway, and she came around the corner and saw us… Man, we couldn't have helped it. There was the sudden scent of fear in the air, and we knew that she was going to bolt. We couldn't help but give in to the chase. She was _ours_, man." The lead wolf lifted his fist, indicating that she had fallen right into their hands, and it was true. If she had known, it was their duty to make sure she would remain silent about it.

"We chased her and she ran. We herded her outside, into the woods, where she wouldn't be able to found. But someone did find her. We weren't even through with her yet, and someone showed up and rescued her!"

"They showed up, just like that?"

The alpha nodded. "Out of the blue, just like that. I don't know how he got here so fast. He must have been on campus already, but I don't know how he knew she was in trouble." The lead werewolf lifted his upper lip in a snarl and huffed. "Unless you believe all this 'soulmate' crap. I hear they can tell when people are in trouble even across great distances."

"Who was it?"

"I don't know, I'd never seen him before."

One of the other weres timidly lifted her hand in the air. "I'd seen him before. Sometimes he sits in on Professor McGugan's lectures, but I don't think he's a student. He's not there all the time, and he never hands anything in. And I don't know his name."

The leader of the pack lifted his head to regard the vampire with a firm expression. "She's our kill first. He chased us away before we could finish the job, apparently. She should have bled out. The girl must either have incredible luck or…"

"Or have already had started the transformation to survive a werewolf attack and then to survive becoming one of us on top of that."

The wolf smiled. "Pity that her luck ended there, since you caught her."

"Could you track this vampire down?"

The plucky wolf girl that recognized the vampire before grinned and bounced excitedly on her feet at the prospect of a hunt, but the snarl in her voice juxtaposed the childlike excitement in her body language. "Of course we can! Don't insult us! We could never forget the way you vampires stink, especially when they interrupt us in the middle of _our_ kill!"

Covering her mouth with his large hand, the male alpha quieted her. A low snarl rumbled out from him until she meekly settled down. Matthias waited until order had been established in the pack and the alpha spoke again. "We _can_ track him down for you, but the real question is _will_ we track him down for you? There's something we want in return for doing your leg work."

"And what's that?"

"To finish the kill that was taken from us. We want the girl when we're done."

Matt frowned. That was beyond his power to give. She should be handed over to the proper Council authorities, to be dealt with according to their rules. "I can't promise you the girl, but I can promise you a hunt. We need to hand the girl over to the Council for trial and execution, but I can get my father to try to swing the Council into letting you have her, and if not her, then a prize for helping to uphold our laws."

"And who the hell is your father that he can get us that when you can't?"

"No, I can't _promise_ you the girl, but I can _try_ to give her to you. There's a difference. And my father is a lawyer. He knows the legal system and can surely get you a deal."

The were didn't look like he wanted to accept it, so Matt leaned forward. "If you don't help, I can always let my father know that it was your pack who gave the girl her human death, botched it, and then stood in the way during the investigation."

"Can you now? Well, so long as my pack has a hunt, I think that we don't care if it's the girl or not, but make damn sure that your father knows we'd prefer to be able to finish the hunt we started. We'll cut class and begin looking for the rogue vampire immediately."

* * *

It was several days old, but the werewolf nose didn't care. It could still smell where Manny's blood had pooled into the rotting leaves, snow, and frozen ground. It could still smell where they themselves had lain in the undergrowth, chewing dying flesh and enjoying the hunt, and it could still smell where the vampire had stood, and where he had leaned over to find the girl barely hanging on to life.

Their scents were musky and wild, the scent of evergreens and cedar, of blood and wet fur. Manouchka's scent was coppery from the blood, enticing with fear, and the alluring promise of death. It sent a howl through the pack, knowing that the kill had been taken from them. They got to hunt prey like Manny, human prey, so rarely, that it had been a prize to find a human they could hunt to the death on the excuse of knowing the Night World existed. The vampire's scent was old, smelling of musty old blood and the scent of old paper and ink.

They traced it through the woods, both the scent of the vampire and the human. Sometimes the scents pooled, where he had stopped to juggle her frail, dying body into a more comfortable position as he traversed the woods. Small pools of blood were hidden among the trees and cedars from her wounds when he stopped. Judging from the soft indentations of his feet, he'd been running. Running had made him sweat, made his scent stronger, and when his scent began to smell of fear, their joy in the hunt increased.

Still, the small wolf trailing at the back of the pack wondered why he was scared. Had he worried they had followed him? Had he worried that she was dying? When had the thought to change her entered into his thoughts? Was it when he had first held her bleeding, dying body to him, or later on?

The scent and the footsteps approached a house. The wolves hid amongst the trees at the back, watching and waiting. A light flicked on in the kitchen. A woman entered and began rummaging in the fridge. She had a rabbit tucked under her arm and tried to offer it some cucumber and salad greens, but the rabbit appeared too frighten to take the food from her. There was no sign of the vampire, but his scent was all over the back yard, and led up to the sliding glass door into the kitchen. Without a doubt, it was his house, so where was he?

The lead wolf swung his head around. _Someone call the vampire,_ he ordered, _and tell him that we have another human to bring him in for questioning._

* * *

_To be continued..._


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

The house was dark when Josua came home. He opened the front door and found that the inside was just as cold as the outside. After Manny being missing the whole day, he was immediately worried, and then he his worry away. Heather had probably had a warm shower, opened a window to let the steam escape, and then went to bed forgetting to close it.

What a day Joshua had had! After the fight with Manny, he'd spent the day driving around the outskirts of North Bay—all the way around the long lake that had given the town its life in the beginning, through the reserve in the north east, the small communities clustered along the highway from the populous south, and then around Trout Lake and the last vestiges of cottage country. It had given him time to think, and the drive was rather pretty.

He still didn't think that Manny was right about wanting to go to school, but they would have to reach some kind of agreement. Maybe she could give up the rest of the school this year at Nipissing and then get a transfer somewhere else. Night Worlders at other universities wouldn't know she was new, or illegal. They would just think that she was a new vampire transfer. And maybe he could let her see her family, and then let the contact fade away slowly. Eventually, Joshua was certain, Manny would see that she had new family in the Night World: Heather, Lacey, Beth and, of course, himself. They would protect her and keep her safe, and before she knew it, her family and their human lives would have ended decades ago while she hadn't aged a day.

He'd let her keep her family, and school, so long as she agreed to move to a place where noone knew that she had been changed illegally. It was a good agreement, Joshua thought.

Except that he couldn't find her to tell her what he had decided.

That was worrisome in more than one way. She was still a new vampire. She shouldn't have been allowed to go out on her own yet. He should have been there with her in school in case she became hungry. Where would she go to feed? How would she know how to feed safely? He shouldn't have let himself leave her side until he knew that she could fend for herself and not risk giving into the blood lust.

As old as he was, he still felt it when he hadn't been feeding properly. When he sat in the back of Heather's lectures, feeling the sharp tightness in his stomach that indicated his body was beginning to be deprived of oxygen, he could smell and hear the blood beating around him. Sacks of bright red oxygen, ready for the taking, and he had to sit there and wait for Heather to finish before he could feed.

How could Manny possibly deal with that if she had to face it? No, he should _not_ have left her.

Joshua entered the kitchen and froze.

The kitchen sliding door had exploded.

No. That was wrong, but it was the first thing that his mind thought of when he saw the ragged glass jutting out from the frame, and the glass shards that decorated the kitchen floor. Explosions were still a new thing for him, and the older part of his mind took a closer look. The door hadn't exploded—something had shattered it coming _through _the door. Joshua leaned over the back door, his shoes making a crunch on the floor. Hair and blood coated some of the jagged edges. Werewolves.

What the hell would werewolves want in his house?

Dark humour rising, he looked around for the body of the rabbit. Maybe one of them had been hunting too close to the house and thought of eating Manny's new pet. But neither the bunny nor the corpse was around.

"Heather?" The Scottish voice rang through the house, and no one answered.

Utensils and salad lay strewn about the floor with the glass. Joshua kicked the wooden salad bowl laying on the floor, and jerked in surprise when the rabbit darted out from where it had been trapped. He smiled with relief and picked the rabbit up before it could cut itself on the glass floor. Joshua tickled the rabbit, which it didn't really seem to like, twisting itself to try to escape his grip.

"Are you really a shapeshifter, little rabbit? Did you cause all this mess? Heather, are you home, love? Manny's new pet has made a mess in the kitchen."

There was still no answer. Tucking the rabbit under his arm, Joshua climbed the stairs. What had looked like a simple accident in the kitchen became frightening as he stood on the second floor landing. The mess continued upstairs, and he felt violated. Someone had ransacked their house. They had burst through the back door, catching Heather in the middle of making supper, and had continued through the rest of the house.

His mind mentally jumped over the obvious question of what the thieves had done with Heather in the kitchen until he could answer it. He hadn't smelled any blood, so whatever had happened to her, she hadn't been hurt… not in the kitchen, anyway.

Joshua began bolting from room to room, finding that each room had been overturned, as if the thieves had been looking for something. Beds had been torn apart, pillows slashed, and jewelry boxes dumped out on the floor—with none of the jewelry missing. Whatever they had been looking for, it hadn't been for money.

He found it when he entered his office. They found what they had wanted and hadn't gone through the rest of the house looking for more. A picture of himself and Heather from England. He remembered it well. They had been only a few years apart then, when the sharing of the blood and the feelings of attraction between them had been the strongest. He had his arm slung over her shoulder and she was squeezing him around his middle. They stood on London Bridge, and the wind had made Heather's hair a halo around her head, while he scarcely looked bothered by it. Her head rested over his heart, as his shoulder tried to protect her from the worst of the wind. One of Heather's hands made the piece sign, and it made him laugh.

The picture had been nailed to the door, along with a note Joshua suspected he'd find had been printed on his own computer. "We have the woman and the girl. Turn yourself in and maybe the woman can be spared. The girl shares the fate of the traitor." Below that was an address.

Traitor? _Traitor!?_ He snarled and ripped the note off of his door. Traitor? HIM? He had helped to make the rules! He was hardly a traitor to the Night World, but they couldn't let him live it in peace!

But the reality was that he had broken the law. Maybe, comparing his crimes, they could let Heather go as a simple misdemeanor, a way for a world-weary vampire to survive, but making a human into a vampire? No, the Council wouldn't let that mistake go.

Turn _himself _in? To _them_?

Joshua had no wish to die. He should just cut and run. He could take his money, live a life somewhere else, become someone else…

He looked back up at the picture, and the way Heather held him close despite knowing how he had to survive, trusting him completely as she used his broad shoulders to hide. He'd protected her since she was a child. He couldn't abandon her now. Joshua swore, crumpling the note in his hand.

Women. He never should have become mixed up with them. He should have become a hermit.

* * *

Someone pushed her down a stairwell, but not hard enough that she couldn't catch herself halfway down. They hadn't intended her to slip and break her neck. Heather heard the door shut and lock, but she ran back up the basement stairwell anyway, pounding on the door and cursing them in Gaelic in between demands that they let her go.

She didn't know these people, but she had recognized Matt Aspen. They'd taken her from her home, made her wait bound and gagged in the snow while they ransacked the house, and then had demanded a lot about Joshua. They wanted to know where he was, what he did for a living, how long they had known each other, and Heather hadn't understood why.

Then they had asked if Joshua had met Manouchka in one of her lectures, and she understood. This had nothing to do with her being a human living with a vampire. This had to do with the fact that Joshua had changed Manny in order to save her.

Something in the darkness beneath her shifted, making Heather freeze. She could barely see in the dark. What did they have lurking in their basement? She groped around, feeling for a light switch.

There was a sound of a wet sniffle. Whoever it belonged to had been crying, and the sound was the sound of a nose being cleared. A few more wet sniffs indicated that someone was scenting the air.

"Heather?" Manny's voice was weak, slurred, and sounded dejected. The edge of hope in the name was heart breaking. "Heather, is that you?"

"Manny?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, hold on, girl! I think I've found a light switch! Watch your eyes, now." She flicked the light and heard the hum of the lights as Manny hissed beneath her. Heather rushed down the steps, rounding the corner, and cursed the name of god in three different language.

Manouchka wasn't in good shape. Hunched around a chair, her normally sleek hair was pulled nilly-willy, like wires bend out of shape. Her clothes were dotted with blood and parts even looked like they had been burned. Her eyes were blood shot from crying, and when Heather sat beside her on the thin basement carpet, she finched away from her.

She'd already seen the tear stains on the cheeks, and searching Manny's arms, she could see cut marks and what looked like burn wounds. Heather reached out, but when Manny hugged herself closer to the chair, she decided to refrain from touching the poor girl in case she hurt her more.

"Manny, what did those bastards do t'ye?" The soft sound of her accent made Manny burst into a new wave of tears.

"They wanted to know who turned me into a vampire. Mr. Aspen tried to drag it from my head, but it didn't work. I think it's because I'm a new vampire, but the blood that made me a vampire isn't as diluted as his. I might be a younger vampire, but the blood that made me was stronger. When he realized that he couldn't get it without weakening me, he began to hurt me: first he used matches, and then, once he got a call from Matthias that they'd found where Joshua lived, he began to use knives. I didn't want them too, but the cuts began healing as soon as he made them. I didn't want them too, but it's like telling your body not to scab. It's going to happen whether you want it to stop or not."

"Cut ye?" She looked down at the poured concrete floor. Half-dried puddles of blood stained the concrete and the feet of Manny's chair. "Why on God's green earth…"

She smiled wryly. Her mouth was hidden in the arms that hugged the chair, but the cheek of her face plumped up from the force of her smile. "Heather, Professor, don't you see? They said they were bringing you over, and the energy I gained from feeding this morning has been run off by forcing my body into healing itself. He stopped hurting me when my body stopped reacting from it. That's when the hunger started up again. I need more oxygen. I need more energy. And then they flung you in here.

"Joshua was breaking the rules keeping you safe and alive after you knew about the Night World. Now they're going to use me to take care of you. But I don't want to do it. I don't want to bite you. Stay away from me."

Heather rolled her eyes. Manny was being melodramatic, which was probably allowed after having been tortured for information. "Manny, you're not going to bite me."

"I know." She broke into a sob that turned into a wail, and hugged her arms tighter around the chair, refusing to let go of it. Heather had seen the position before—people with stomach cramps curling around the area to protect it. Except that Manny was holding the chair instead, like it was a lifesaver to keep her afloat. "God, it _hurts_ so much."

She turned her face then, letting the cool wood of the chair soak into her cheek, and Heather could see her teeth. Her fangs were down, resting lightly against her bottom lip. Heather had grown up seeing them on Joshua, but on one of her students they looked more than just a little odd and frightening. Manny saw her eyeing them and lifted a finger, running it down the curve of the graceful tooth.

"It won't go back to being normal. No matter what I think about, it stays that way, and every time I breathe…" She took a deep breath the illustrate, and Heather could guess what was happening. Her shoulders tensed and she made a little sound of pain when the air passed by the sensitive teeth. "Every time I breathe or speak, or something brushes them, it makes it harder to calm down. I… I bit myself, hoping that it would make it better, but it didn't. It just made the feeling so much worse."

"Manny, you need oxygen or you'll die," Heather said.

"Then let me die. If I die, then Joshua's work'll be undone."

"And?"

Manny blinked. "If I'm dead, then how could he get in trouble for changing me?"

"All the time, the risk and energy he put into saving you, would ye let that go so quickly?"

"I'm not letting it go, I'm returning the favor!" she said indignantly.

"You could just bite me and get it over with and then all of us could live."

She laughed bitterly, and Heather realized she was hugging the chair so that she wouldn't feel like grabbing her, instead. "I don't know if I could stop before I drank you dry, Heather. I'm not going to take that risk. Just stay far away from me, and if Joshua does show up, then I swear that I'll eat whatever he puts in front of me. He could give me a farm, and I could be happy with sheep and cow and pig, just no humans. I can't kill to live."

"That's why you feed in small, regular doses, and then you won't kill anyone. Joshua doesn't live off of chattle, and you won't either. He hasn't bitten me in a long time, Manny. He was saving me for when you woke up, so that you would have someone willing that you couldn't put at risk."

Manny sobbed. "But it hurts _so_ much, and I don't know how much it would take before it stops hurting! They want me to give in to the pain, to hurt you, to do their dirty work for them, and I won't!"

Now Manny was just being silly. Mad and uncertain of what else to do, Heather lashed out and gave Manny the smallest slap to her cheek. The sound of flesh meeting flesh, and the fact that it was caused by a friend she trusted, stopped Manny's sobs right away.

"You stupid git," Heather hissed. "I'm old, and I know the way the world works. If you hurt me, then so be it, at least you'll get to live one more day. Joshua risked a lot to save you. He put himself through hell to save you, and I won't let his pain go to waste just because you're too scared to find out if you can stop. One day, I won't be here for him, but you will be. You'll be there for him for all of eternity if you could pull your vampire head out of your human ass and realize that this is who and what you are now. At least you stand a chance of defending yourself against these people, and seeing as how they haven't cracked into your thick skull yet, it looks like you have a good job of living through this until Joshua can come and get us, but do you think you'll be in a position to help out if you can't do anything but hug that damn chair? Unless you think that chair-hugging will make Mr. Aspen upstairs quake in his booties."

"What did you say?"

"Do you think that Mr. Aspen would…"

"No, before that. About forever." Her golden eyes had warmed slightly, filling with the slightest bit of hope and udnerstanding. "Joshua… he didn't just do this—saving me—out of compassion, did he? He's lonely."

Heather nodded. "Aye, lass. It's lonely being a vampire and having people you like grow up and then die right in front of your eyes. I don't think that he saw an opportunity or anything, but once he thought you would live, he was so happy. I've never seen him wear a smile that big."

"He… he really does want to protect me, doesn't he? Whenever he starts being an ass, it's because he's trying so hard to keep us safe."

"Aye, right again, lass. He's still not used to being told no, even though I tried hard to get him used to hearing it. Joshua's a survivor."

"Then… Then maybe I can be a survivor too. I don't want his hard work to go to waste. But… oh, Heather! I'm so scared that I might not be able to stop!"

Heather reached out and placed her hand against Manny's cheek. It was damp with tears again. "Lass, I've lived around Joshua since before I can remember. I can keep you from killing me, and you need blood to live."

Manny released the chair, and her small little hands were like iron rings around Heather's arms. Her breath smelled like blood, and Heather wondered how badly, or how frequently, she'd bitten her own arms in an effort to stop the pain that made her slight body shake. Heather shut her eyes against the bright lights. She'd always found it easier to give blood when you didn't see them looming in.

"Please don't tell Joshua," she pleaded.

"That you bit me, or that he tortured you?"

"Neither. Don't tell him I want to live so I can see him smiling again."

Heather laughed in the dark and put a motherly arm around Manny, as if keeping her safe from the wind on the London Bridge. Manny's nose brushed her chin. "You're still laughing at him coming in from the back yard with that rabbit, aren't ye? Lord, that was a sight for sore eyes!"

Both of them laughed, remembering the thousands-year old vampire caught looking like a nervous schoolboy as he innocently offered the rabbit to Manny, not knowing how it would offend her so. Heather laughed until she cried, but Manny was too busy drinking to notice the tears that were slipping over her cheeks.

Heather just kept seeing Joshua walk in the back door, see the surprise lighten his eyes, the relief at seeing Manny awake and standing in their kitchen, and she knew that she had lost Joshua. She didn't know when Joshua had started feeling for Manny, or why, and she wondered if it was just a fad, but something in him loved the little human girl. Manny didn't know yet, or if she knew pretended not to, but Joshua wouldn't risk his way of life for just anybody. He loved Manouchka, and she sometimes thought that even he didn't know it.

* * *

Someone pounded on the door to the apartment, and Lacey cursed them mildly. "I said, will you hold your freaking horses? I'm coming, okay? This had better be worth getting up and off of the couch in the middle of freaking _Grey's Anatomy_ and my supper, or I swear on the head of all that his holy that… oh." She blushed when she opened the door and found that it was Joshua. He looked like good with his hair mussed out of place, breathing heavily, and wearing only a t-shirt and jeans, even if it did make him look stressed. "Hey, Josh."

From the way he glared at her, too out of breath to say anything, she guessed that was the first and last time he'd let her get away with calling him "Josh". She rolled her eyes and held the door open for him, beginning back to her blanket and supper cooling on the coffee table. McDreamy was silence with a quick muting of the television.

"What's up? I don't think I'm ready for another snack session yet."

"Manny's missing."

Lacey jumped back up off the couch, nearly spilling her pasta. "What? Since when?"

"This morning. She wanted to attend class and I… I…" He wanted to say _I didn't have the heart to stop her_, but Joshua didn't want to admit the weakness. Even a few days ago, he would have been more than willing to throw her over his shoulder to keep her from endangering his lifestyle, but then… but then what? A few days ago they hadn't kissed? A few days ago she hadn't tilted back her head, told him to bite her, and found that he couldn't because of nervousness and because he knew it made her scared?

"And she wouldn't listen when I tried to stop her. I had hoped that she would be okay, but now I'm starting to think she might not have been."

"Why didn't you just stop her from going physically? She's not even a day old yet! She shouldn't have been left alone!"

Lacey certainly did know how to hit a man where it hurt. He pulled himself up to hull height, squaring his shoulders against her anger. "I know, okay! I was stupid to let her go, and I should have stopped her! I don't know why I let her go, but it's done! Whoever took Manny tracked her to my house and took Heather, too. They're holding them hostage for me."

Lacey's face scrunched and she looked ready to burst into tears. If she started to cry, Joshua didn't know what he would do. Had it been Heather he would hold her until they passed, but this witch would be just as likely to blame him and scalp him as she would appreciate being held. Witches. They were either ice or flame, and since both were such extremes they burned when held, it was really hard to tell if they needed warmth and comforting or a solid kick in the ass to get moving.

"Manny could already be dead. It's clearly a trap. What are you going to do about it?"

"I'm telling you, hoping that you could call in reinforcements. We'll go in and get them out of that house by force."

"Why? So they can shoot my best friend as soon as they see you and the rest of your friends waving pitch forks in the air? And why do you need _my_ reinforcements? Use your own lackeys! You're old enough for it, aren't you?"

His eyes were a strangely violet shade that Lacey knew belonged solely to the Night World. Had Manny been present, she would have warned her friend that Joshua was getting angry, but Lacey could tell that on her own from the terse way he spoke to her. "Aye, I have me own 'lackeys', lass, but there's a catch. First, either they're human and I use them for food, and I willna be sending humans into a den o'Night Worlders to rescue Manny and Heather. Second, I have some companions that are Night Worlders themselves, but do you think they would help me once I told them we're going to be rescuing a human and a newly turned vampire? Ach, they'd be just as likely to end up helping whoever took Heather once they find out how I've been bending the rules to my own ends these years."

"And so you expect me to rescue the lives of my own friends?"

Joshua sighed suddenly, looking tired. "Lass, I'm asking for ye to call on Daybreak for help. It's them I need—they'll accept Heather and Manny and not care that I broke the rules, because I did it with honor and justice in my heart. Can ye not call them for me?"

She eyed him warily, hands on her hips sternly. Finally she sighed, and began trying to track down her phone. "I think that Poppy and Ash are still in town. I'll give them a ring and see if they can help."

"Ash? Ash Redfern?"

He'd paled a little at the name, and his eyes had flipped suddenly to a light blue gently tinted with grey. It was a cautious color, trying to be blue and failing, and Lacey realized with surprise that he was nervous. The name had made him nervous.

"Is there any other Ash?"

Joshua smiled faintly. "I suppose there wouldn't be. Please, call away. I hope that they're still in town, and I look forward to seeing them."

* * *

The house was completely normal: a half-dead tree on the front yard, windows with white blinds, and slightly peeling paint. But when Joshua looked at it closely, he could see the small things about the house that revealed there were Night Worlders living there: unlike the houses on either side of it, there were no pigeon droppings on the roof, because the birds avoided it, the Halloween decorations which remained up were a little too authentic and decorous, the windows had tinting on the inside to keep the sunlight away from sensitive vampire eyes, and the thick curtains behind the blinds were meant to keep out light and muffle sounds.

Inside the house, Manny and Heather were being held prisoner, and he could smell vampires and werewolves. They were working together to uphold Night World law, and that worried him. Vampires and werewolves did not naturally get along, as they were competing top predators, and the fact that they would consider Manny such a threat was… alarming.

A man peeked out the window nervously, then scampered away. Joshua corrected himself. It had been a young man, with nervous brown hair and a nose that revealed he'd gotten into fights earlier in his life. He looked like he could have been Manny's age. Joshua frowned. So, she had exposed herself by going into the university after all.

Damn it to hell, why hadn't he stopped her?

But he knew the answer, and there were so many of them! He couldn't pick which one had been the one foremost in his mind at the time. He didn't want to force her, even though he had known that his own safety hung in the balance. Joshua, despite his rough demeanor, couldn't imagine forcing anyone to do something against their will, having had that inflicted upon himself and knowing firsthand the anger and resentment it caused.

He also knew that he could physically stop her, but the stop of reaching out and touching that fragile, dark skin was… frightening. His body was physically afraid of touching hers since she had been changed. Perhaps it was because when he had thought she was dying there had been a pull so intense it felt like his entire body was hell bent upon saving her, but whatever the true reason of it, he had frozen at the thought of touching her.

Taking a deep breath, he savored his last seconds of freedom and hoped that Lacey and her friends would come through. He hadn't had time to waste to see if Ash Redfern and the girl named Poppy were still in town. Joshua knew that if he had been the one assigned (or presumably in this case, self-appointed) to tracking down the vampire who had made Manny, he wouldn't leave them out of his sight for very long. They would know that he made contact with Lacey, and he hoped that turning himself in would keep them from paying too much attention to what she was doing.

He walked up the front steps. A woman answered the door. She had the same mousy-brown hair that he had seen on the young man peeking out the window, but her eyes were a soft shade of grey. She politely held the door open, looking almost timid as she stood behind it, using it as a shield between them in case he should attack her.

"They didn't expect you to actually arrive," she admitted, in a hushed voice that reminded him of the murmur of wind through the trees.

Joshua shrugged, his hands shoved deep into his front pockets, his shoulders hunched defensively. "When they hold two of my companions hostage, I don't really have much of a choice."

She nodded in understanding. "That Manny girl… I'm sorry for her. She seemed like such a nice girl from what Matthias said about her in school."

Joshua did not appreciate her use of the past tense.

The woman shut the door behind him as he entered their hallway. He was well aware that the men were waiting to pounce on him. The husband, Matthias' father who possessed the same carved cheekbones and chin of his son, stood on the stairwell. Matt himself stood in the kitchen. There was a werewolf standing at the door to the basement, and another two standing in the living room. The mother quickly scurried away to stand between her son and Joshua protectively.

Joshua pitied them.

The werewolves moved as one, attacking from all side at once. They expected him to fight back, but he let them grab him and drag him to the ground, pining his body to the floor and wrestling his hands behind his back. A snarl escaped him when he felt wooden handcuffs close around his wrists. He hated feeling trapped, and the way the werewolves jumped in surprise wasn't nearly worth the feeling of helplessness he suffered with his hands behind his back.

They lifted him off the ground. A lock of hair, tinted white in the streetlamps that filtered into the house, fell into his eyes as he stood again after being manhandled. Matt's father stood in front of him, and the two men eyed each other.

"Hello, Aspen."

"Hello, Joshua. I wasn't aware you were still in town. After you left the Council, we lost touch with you."

He smiled. "I didn't really want to be contacted by the Council. I wanted a few centuries of peace and quiet to enjoy all the books I couldn't find time to read over the past few centuries."

Aspen's reaction was quick. A blow to the sternum left Joshua supported by the werewolves on either side of him, coughing for air. He didn't need it, but the human reaction was purely physical and impossible to get rid of.

"That was for lying to me just now. You left the Council, and you took the law into your hands, ignoring the rules when they were of a good opportunity for you."

"Get off your high horse, Aspen. Everyone does that. Humans fail to stop at a four-way when they're the only ones around. I find a ready source of food that's willing to put up with me knowing exactly what I am. Years of a steady, healthy supply of blood for one moment of honesty? The Council is out-dated. There are humans out there that would kill to live alongside us, and yet we cling to these rules because we're so used to hiding from _everyone_ that we've built ourselves into a corner! We can't keep living like animals! Humans will raise cattle for food—we need to wisen up and do the same for food, instead of living hunting and preying off of drunks in the streets or people we seduce in clubs that could have anything living in their blood."

Aspen folded his arms over his chest. He was unimpressed with these ideas. "And the black girl? Where did she come in?"

"Manny, Dad." Aspen glared at his son, who kept his head held high despite the glare being shot at him down the narrow hallway to the kitchen. "Her name is Manny."

"Manny was supposed to replace Heather, but something went wrong. She was attacked by a group of werewolves—but you already know that, don't you? I gave her my blood. I never expected her to actually live through the transition. She's too old. I expected that I would have to kill her as a ghoul, but she managed to make the change."

"If that is the case, and we will tell after a formal trial, then your little science experiment needs to die. As for you, I'm sure that the Council will understand that this was nothing more than you having a moment of weakness and an indulgence and will let you off lightly since this was an accident. Until then, we're holding you on the premises."

Both men holding Joshua tightened their grip on him and lifted him slightly, so that only the balls of his feet remained on the floor. He hissed at them and they relaxed their grip when they saw that he wasn't going to fight them. Joshua would walk to wherever they were going to take him. He'd only fight if he needed more time for Ash and Poppy to arrive…

Although if Lacey had gotten a hold of them, and if they were even going to show up, remained to be seen.

Aspen opened the door to the basement. Joshua's nostrils flared when he realized that even from the top of the stairs, mingled with the scents of fabric softener and the damp smell of all basements, was the scent of blood. He could smell Heather—familiar and soothing, with the hint of the mint creams she used when she bathed—and Manny—rich and exotic, still new and tingly on the tip of his tongue.

He glared at Aspen, his brows drawing together in a thick knot of ferocity. Aspen smiled. "What the hell did you do to them?"

"The girl refused to give up your name. I tried persuading her in the kindest methods I knew possible, but even these she stubbornly resisted."

"You mean you used telepathy on her, you bloody sonofabitch!"

He had wanted to only resist if necessary, but at the thought of Aspen standing over Manny, torturing her using telepathy, his body reacted on its own. His muscles twitched and he suddenly jerked forward before the werewolves could stop him. Arms behind his back, he plowed into Aspen in a tackle that launched them both over the top of the stairwell. A tangle of legs and arms, they both tumbled down the rickety wooden stairs into the basement.

Aspen landed on the ground first, Joshua on top of him. Joshua's teeth were sharp enough to cut his bottom lip as he snarled, hungry for blood. But he couldn't get a clean shot in, so he stood up and began kicking, the toe of his boots landing in Aspen's side in sharp, expert kicks.

Something large and hard hit him, and he went down on his shoulder. He heard a loud crack and a pop and realized when he was hauled to his feet again by the werewolves that he'd dislocated the shoulder thrown into the cement floor. It didn't hurt at all—not from shock, but from the bloodlust that caused him to want to rip open Aspen's throat.

Standing again, breathing through his mouth and feeling blood run down from a broken nose, he surveyed the basement.

Heather was crumpled in the corner. Blood coated the neckline of her shirt, but otherwise she seemed unharmed. He couldn't tell if she was unconscious or asleep, but since her chest was moving he was guaranteed that she was alive.

Under her arm, nestled against the side of her body, was small, dark Manny. Her lips were still stained with blood, making it obvious just who had drunk Heather's blood. Eyes closed, she looked almost peaceful, but she breathed through her mouth just as he did. Under her dark skin he could see ghostly bruises that gave her face strange shadows, her hair was disarrayed from her normal style, and he could see the burn marks in her skin and clothes. Her arms were wrapped around Heather's waist, clinging to her like a life saver.

He felt a small stab of painful relief knowing that both of them were alive, but it didn't solve the problem of getting them out of the basement. Neither did it quell the anger in him, knowing that they had been hurt to get at him.

Snarling, he spat blood from his mouth and glared at Aspen as the other vampire picked himself off of the floor. His eyes flicked back to the girls and he saw a faint flutter from Manouchka. The noise had awoken her, and for a moment he though she was only feigning being asleep, before he realized that with her injuries, she couldn't open her eyes all the way.

Aspen had risen to his feet and smirked. Joshua had no defense as the blows came, hard and compact. He hung from the werewolves, weakened by the blows that left him doubled over as Aspen used his stomach as his own personal punching bag. His right shoulder was beginning to turn into a dull ache that Joshua knew from experience would turn into a burning sensation if left untreated.

"Dad!"

Matthias and his mother stood at the top of the stairs, watching the proceedings with horror-filled eyes. No, Joshua corrected himself, the boy was horrified at seeing his father becoming physical and brutal, but the wife didn't care. She pitied him, but by the stubborn set of her jaw, he could see that she felt the same way as her husband: Joshua had broken Night World law and needed to be punished.

"Get him out of here. Weakling. I thought that you'd be ready to see this, but you're not. Where did your mother and I go wrong raising you?" He cracked his knuckles, arms stiffly at his side. "Your brothers would be down here helping to hold him up for me, but not you. Get out of my sight before you make me ill."

Matthias turned and fled without looking back to see how Manny fared.

His father turned back to Joshua and the weres supporting what was quickly becoming dead weight. He nodded to the chair that had held Manny's limp body only a few hours before. The werewolves turned and plunked Joshua down, then stood on either side of him, pressing down on his shoulders to keep him seated. His face scrunched in pain when they touched his right side, but then it faded away under a stubborn mask.

Manny could barely see, but she was aware of Joshua. He showed up as colors: bright green as he tumbled down the stairs, and shifting grey-green, with swirls of blue, as he sat in the chair. When they touched his shoulder, he flared red and gold with pain and Manny felt a sudden surge of adrenaline. They were hurting him, and instinct told her to stop them. She shifted against Heather's body, her limbs heavy with satiation and from the exhaustion of torture, but she was going to at least try to stop them from hurting Joshua.

How she was going to fight them when she could barely see them—well, she didn't have that part planned out yet. Step one: stand up. Step two: fight. Step three: save Joshua. It seemed easy, if only she could get step one to work properly.

Something touched her mind, and out of instinct she flinched and threw up all the mental defenses she could muster to protect her mind from the pain and force of the intrusion. In her vision, Joshua's form was a bright burst of blue for a moment, before it returned to the stewing grey-green. She calmed down when she realized that the force wasn't intrusive. Wherever the thoughts came from, they weren't coming from Matt's father.

She shut her eyes, and eased back on her defenses enough to let the thoughts drift close enough so she could hear them without letting them into her mind. _Are you all right?_

The words belonged to Joshua. She was so tired that they barely left a pinch in her mind. Manny relaxed at once at the hint of that Scottish accent, and she watched as the colours turned bright blue again. He was happy. He knew that she had heard him. Manny turned her attention to trying to answer him, but didn't know how. She nodded weakly and the bright blue flashed again.

_Good. And Heather?_

Manny nodded again. Heather was all right. She was tired and drained, but Manny knew she hadn't taken too much. She had taken enough to keep her body alive in oxygen, but not enough so that her body could finish healing. The knowledge that she had stopped made her proud, and Joshua chuckled in her mind at feeling it.

His thoughts were there, just outside of hers, without barriers in his mind. Manny wondered where his shields had gone, before he was waiting patiently for her to lower hers. He knew she didn't know how to answer him, but if she let him, he could enter her mind and feel her own thoughts and feelings, not just direct his thoughts to her. With a nervous breath that left her bottom lip trembling in anxious excitement, Manny lowered the shields.

She had thought that there wouldn't be enough room in her thoughts for two people. When Aspen had forced his way in, her head had felt like it was being crushed. Joshua's presence was different. He flowed in gently, like water, filling the nooks and crannies of her mind. He didn't try to force himself in, but let her take only as much as she could hold.

Her thoughts were placed out before her, and he could feel her nervousness. She shook around him like leaves, or a frightened animal. _I shouldn't have let you gone. I should have stopped you. You might have hated me for it, but at least this never would have happened to you._

_No,_ Manny argued.

_Yes, I should have stopped you._

_No, I meant that I wouldn't have hated you for it. Well, I would have at first, but I would have been able to get over it. Still, this has not been the best day in the world. _

_No, I'd imagine that it wouldn't have been._

Manny heard something crack. She struggled to open her eyes, but even with them closed, she could see the flare of red from where Joshua sat. She began to try and lift her head again.

_Manny, there's nothing that you can do to stop them. You're weak and injured, and they're fully grown men who know how to use their powers._

_I don't care. I want to try to stop them from hurting you._

_That's very brave of ye, lass, but ye can do nothing to stop them. If ye really want to help me, then stay there, and let me…_ He paused, his thoughts stilled around her, and Manny imagined him licking his lips nervously. _Let me hide in here with you where they cannae touch me._

Asking for asylum had been hard for him. Manny knew that his pride was great. For Joshua, it was harder hiding than it was fighting, but as Heather had said, Joshua was a survivor. She tried to ease his feelings by being friendly and teasing. _Your accent gets thicker even in your mind when you're emotional, you know._

_I know, lass. _The barest hint of a chuckle, amused at Manny stating the obvious, and then silence. They were shy at the sudden intimacy, neither taking a mental breath in case they hurt the other.

_I didn't turn you in, Joshua._

There was another snap, and then Manny heard a match being struck. Joshua's aura flared red, and stayed that way. Manny wished she could turn her head away, but even if she turned further to the side, pressing against Heather's body, she could see the flares of color from the corner of her eyes, like little fireworks.

_Aye, lass, I know. Ye cannae believe how much that means to me, that ye'd go that far to protect me._

_Is the Professor awake yet? She's bonded to you too. Shouldn't she see what I do?_

_What is it that ye see, lass?_

_Well… you. Your colours._

_Ahh… weel now, no, I don't think Heather'd be waken up for that. She doesn't have the talent for telepathy that you do—the natural resistance to it, nor the knack for using it to protect yourself and others._

_I… I… what?_

_Aye, lass. _His thoughts gently pressed against the wall she had built around her innermost feelings, squeezing briefly without being rough. Something like a shiver went through Manny. _Not every new vampire could have made something like this. I'm hiding right now in you. It's like an umbrella, ye ken? So long as I stay here with you, some part of me will remain untouched by them._

_I wish I could do more. I wish I could take all three of them on for you and get them to stop hurting you._

_I ken, lass, I ken, but this is more than enough._

_Joshua?_

_Aye, Manny?_

_Will you ever tell me how you were changed into a vampire?_

He chuckled, feeling her curiosity and the edge of a mind that needed a foil. Manny's feeling were built up around him, sheltering him and protecting him from the loose hold to his body. She needed to know if the things she felt, the things she saw and sensed, if they were normal or not.

_Aye, lass, I will. I should have told ye before I'd made ye, but there wasna enough time. I'll tell you everything now, though there isna much to tell._

* * *

_To be continued..._

AN: Scottish accents? Fun, but also kinda annoying to write...


	13. Chapter 13

**AN:** Welcome to the last chapter of BB. I told you there wasn't much left, which is why this is a longer chapter. Following this, there is a short epilogue. It's been fun, and hopefully Joshua's history was worth waiting for. Thanks to everyone who reviewed and reminded me to update. :) I really could not have done it without you.

* * *

Chapter Thirteen

I was not born, _Joshua told Manny_, in Scotland. I was born in what would be present-day Saudia Arabia. I've never taken a good look at the maps, and after four thousand years, the memories aren't much to go by, so let's just agree that I was born in Saudia Arabia, though it could have easily have been Africa, Palestine, Turkey, or Constantinople.

The Bible tells you that I was born in Egypt, and in the movie with that guy from the NRA would have you believe I hard dark, curly hair, but the book is as old as I am, and stories have been merged together. I was never a slave to build the pyramids, although perhaps some other Joshua was, and perhaps he even had the dark, curly hair you see in the movies. I was, however, a great warrior, and I did help end the walled city Jericho.

I was indeed Jewish. I was young. I was human. There isn't much to tell about my human life, actually. It was hard work to survive back then—it was hard work to survive period. But there were good times, too. The community was strong and we would help each other.

My mother died in childbirth, giving birth to my younger brother. My father remarried, being young still. I had many siblings—five of them, in fact. Only one was related to me directly, and the others were all half-siblings from my father's second wife. My brother's name was Alexander, and I doted on him as if he were my whole world. While other boys his age would walk, I would carry him so that the stones would not cut his feet.

We did indeed wander the desert, but we weren't lost. We were nomads. Sometimes we tried to settle, but something always got in the way. There were battles with other nomads, and fights within our tribes. Sometimes I fought in them, and sometimes I didn't, but I did quickly earn a name for myself as a fighter. I was large and strong for my age, and people remembered it when they crossed me or my younger siblings.

Father wanted me to grow up and become a scholar. Mother wanted me to grow up to become a farmer. I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I felt empty, and it was only when I had something to work on, either with my hands or my mind, that I felt whole again. I hunted, with the other men in our tribe, but it was always working with wood that held my interest, and I dreamed of someday settling down and taking up the trade, marrying and passing down my work to my sons, and one day to my grandsons.

We did indeed eventually settle. I took a wife. She was a sweet young girl, who would welcome me home with open arms whether I was coming in from a field working, or after a battle defending our land from invading armies and lions alike, or from the temple where I spent my free time. My wife made me happy. Coming home was always a good experience, and at the time I thought I might even love her, but the truth is, I only remain very fond of her now. Four thousand years is a long time to stay in love with a ghost, and though I do feel a slight pain when I thing about her, I have dealt with my ghosts and have lain them to rest.

Let me tell you more about my siblings. Alexander was my favorite. He had the same hair I did, and his eyes were as green as… as the greenest thing you could imagine. He reminded everyone of a great cat, though he never became as large or as tough as I did, he was wiry and flexible where I was strength and stamina. We were a formidable team on the battlefield.

I had two sisters: Nilly and Tal. They were both good girls. They were married young, and Nilly died in childbirth. I never really got to know her very well. I didn't spend much time with either of my sisters, because they were girls. Mother always had them under her wing, raising them to become good wives and mothers.

I don't want to speak ill of the dead, but Tal was my favorite between my sisters. She would never be the flesh-and-shield brother I was with Alex, but she was the more inquisitive of the two. She would always want to know why I was doing something. She was a little mosquito in my ear, always asking me 'why', 'why', 'why'? I regret not cherishing more of that thirst for knowledge, but as I have said, I have accepted it and moved on.

Then there was my half-brother, Noa. Alex and I were never close to him, either, because we didn't want to be. You understand, he was only our_ half_ brother, and the youngest one in the family. When Alex and I went off to hunt, he was always too young or too small, too _inexperienced_ to come along with us safely. As a result, he was always left at home with the women and the old men, and he grew to resent the love we had for one another, my brother and I.

I knew, at the time, that he was becoming angry. I accept that now. What happened was partially my fault. If I had known just how cruel and twisted he was becoming, I would have tried to be more of a big brother to him. I would have tried to love him, as I should have. But at the time, I simply didn't care. I had my own flesh and blood and my wife to worry about. And my wife was pregnant. Soon I'd have a little son to dote over.

While I was busy building my life, for seventeen was an adult in those times, my half-brother fell into a wrong crowd. They were the bullies and troublemakers of our community. When I think of them now, I know what they were: the shapeshifters and the werewolves and the dark witches, all of whom had already been around for some time on the evolutionary chain. They could feel his hatred and his jealousy, and they toyed with him with it.

Until one of them, a vampire, decided to give him the power to do something to change it. She gave my brother her blood, and turned him into a vampire. When he discovered he was faster and stronger than an ordinary man should be, he came after me.

I could not stop him. He forced me to the ground, pinned me there, and drank my blood. He cut his wrist and held it to my mouth. I began choking on the blood that ran down my throat, until I was forced to swallow it to avoid drowning in it. It is easier, safer, to change a vampire slowly, but it _can_ be done all at once. I drank, and drank, and so did he, until I felt my heart slow down, and finally stop all together. There was a strange lucidity as he picked me up, as if I weighed nothing at all, and carried me to the small hut used by his friends.

I remained there for three days as the changes finished in my body, honing it into a perfectly killing weapon. When I awoke, I felt better and stronger than I ever had in my life, but I was worried about my family. I rushed home to them at once—to my beautiful, red-headed wife, and my newborn son. My wife had thought me missing, presumed dead, and flung herself at me in her joy and relief.

As I held her, I became aware of just how hungry I was, and just how soft she was. Her skin was so supple and smooth. I tightened my arms around her and felt that I could just hold her until she burst. And she would burst blood. Bright, red, sweet, succulent, _blood_. She began squirming away, trying to break free my hold, because I was holding her so tightly, I was hurting her, but I could not find the will to let go. She looked up at my face, and nearly screamed.

She knew I was no longer the Joshua she had married.

I licked my lips and I felt my fangs. My brother had turned me into whatever he had been when he has attacked me. I wanted her blood so much, it was painful. I sank my teeth into her neck clumsily, and this time she did scream. I covered her mouth with my hand to stifle the sound, and struck at her neck again and again until my teeth finally sank into the right spot and her blood burst into my mouth. The pain began to lessen as I drank, and I slowly became aware that the baby was crying.

Her blood was everywhere. I had punctured her jugular, and it was a bright waterfall down her body, down my body, and a puddle on the ground between us. Her body was limp in my arms. I had killed enough deer and defended our family against enough lions and jackals to recognize a dead body when I saw it. My senses had returned to me, and I cut my own wrist, pressing it to her mouth, _trying_ to get her to swallow… but she was already dead. My blood simply dripped on her face and mouth and sullied her body further.

And my son kept wailing.

I hunted down my brother after changing into some fresh clothes. I cleaned my wife's body and had left it there in the hut, knowing someone would come and check on my screaming son eventually. Hopefully a wet nurse could be found for him, and he would be able to survive. I would not go near him again, until I had the hunger within me under control.

Noa explained to me what we are. I could not accept it. I left him, snuck out of my own village, and fled, until I could learn to satiate the hunger. Eventually I returned to the cities and villages of the world, and learned of others like myself. I learned how to interact with humanity, take blood from humans without killing them and without being caught, and all the time, I hated my brother for turning me into this.

Eventually I became strong and powerful enough to join the Council. I began to see my life as an opportunity to learn, to explore and see the world, and I did. Where our kind broke the laws, I was there to punish them and find out why those rules had been broken. Every century it seemed as though more deaths were happening by my hand, but after coming to holding the body of my wife in my arms, I did not care much for the lives of strangers I took.

One day, a young man joined the Council. His name was Hunter Redfern. Yes, Redfern, Ash's father. He was charismatic, charming, likeable, and ruthless and cunning. A countless numbers of lifetimes had passed between the little boy I left crying in his cradle, but I could see my wife in the man before me at that Council meeting… and I could see myself, too. My heir, my descendent, had become one of us.

It was time I left the Council. I had tired of all the politics, the mire of shifting faces, the internal battles. I resigned from the Council, and left the New World. New England had become tiresome and boring. I began traveling again, using my own two legs to travel from the ports of Prague to Japan, and then back through Russia and England. When I returned, I had found that several hundred years had passed, and times had changed. Time didn't seem to change in the tundra of Russia, the Mongolian desert, or avoiding tigers in Indian jungles. During my journey, the world had entered the Modern Era, and the Napoleonic Wars had just begun.

I found myself enlisted as a soldier, though I did not care for war. I moved up quickly through the ranks, and found that I rather liked the espionage. Being a vampire made me good at discovering secrets and at keeping them. I remained in England for quite some time, catching up on history at the prestigious libraries and museums, and once again becoming sociable.

It was there that I met another one of my kind. He had been drafted as well. He was younger than I by several generations, but he had learned much more than I had in my lifetime. Vampires do not have to feed every day, but regularly. It takes a human being about a week to be able to replenish the blood lost by a feeding. By cycling through two or three people every week, a vampire could feed with neither having to hunt, nor kill to live.

It became my new lifestyle, but you already know all about that. Of course, most people cycle through people on a monthly basis, because otherwise the bloodbond becomes too strong. You start caring for the girl more than you should. I decided to embrace it. Maybe the bloodbond is part of how vampires are supposed to feed. Since it's mutual, she won't be tempted to wander, and you feel obligated to protect them. I think it's meant to protect your food source.

Unfortunately, the Council didn't like the fact that I fed off of them for years and would tell them all about the Night World so that they would understand just what I was, so I went into hiding. I met Heather, eventually we moved here to Canada, and now you know everything.

* * *

Manny was quiet and thoughtful. Her thoughts buoyed Joshua's, keeping him safe and comforted. His story had been quick, given how many years he had lived, and yet she thought that he had showed her the most painful memory he had. How long had it really taken him to come to terms with regaining his sanity and finding his wife's body in his arms? How many years had it taken before he could learn to love someone again?

_You once told me that you understood being changed against your will… I realize now why you were so worried to keep me from Lacey the morning I woke up, why you are so reluctant to keep me from my family. I'm sorry that you were changed back then, Joshua, and I am sorry about your wife, too._

_Being sorry is human. There's no use giving me yer condolences. It happened a long time ago, lass._

_That doesn't make the pain in your past any easier though, does it? Time does not heal all wounds._

There was silence from Joshua's mind, but slowly, softly, he agreed. _No, lass, time does na'heal all wounds._ _In fact, I think there are some wounds which only become worse wit' time._

She could hear it in his voice. He was lonely. Manny wondered why she had never heard it when they spoke out loud. She suspected that when Joshua spoke out loud, he used his body—his reserved stance, his cold eyes—and his clothes to hide the fact that he was lonely. He had watched everyone he had ever become close to leave him: a wife, a brother, a family…

_You have me, you know. Right now. For what it's worth._

The flare of red that had become Joshua's order suddenly turned bright blue for a second, before the pain of his body consumed him again. _It's worth a lot, Manny._

* * *

Aspen studied Joshua. His head was inclined, eyes half-closed. Blood dotted his face, hands, and clothes. Toothpicks were still imbedded here and there in his skin, sticking out of his hands, arms, and legs like quills. His breathing was raspy, but still steady.

He should have been more hurt from the poison coursing through his system. He should have been crying or begging or _something_ by now. Aspen didn't care how stoic Joshua had always been, all the cutting, stabbing, the dislocated shoulder and the broken arm should have caused him some physical pain… Instead he just sagged in the chair with the eerie half-closed eyes, acting like he was _resting_!

_How is he doing it? How is he numbing the pain?_ A vampire as old as Joshua had always claimed to be had to have some kind of mental defense! _He must be protecting himself in some way… shielding his mind or…Or hiding in someone else's mind._

There were stories, of course. There are always stories. Vampires gifted with telepathy could hide in someone else's mind, allowing themselves to follow their targets home, learn about their lives, see the world through their eyes. There were stories of vampires who could possess someone's mind and walk their victims to their lair, so that they would not have to see daylight to feed. And there were stories, mostly involving the soulmate theory, that a vampires could join minds with someone until their thoughts were so tightly intertwined that they thought and felt as a single entity.

He turned slowly, looking at the young girl and the old professor. Which one was sheltering his mind for him? His eyes landed on Manny's inert form. Of course. Joshua had changed her, so there must, Aspen reasoned, be some kind of mental connection between them. He also knew that Manny had natural skill with telepathy, so she had the mental capability of sheltering Joshua's mind…

Of course, there was a chance that her mind was so strong that Aspen wouldn't be able to get to Joshua… He grinned and cracked his knuckles. It was time to move on to another kind of torture.

Aspen leaned over Joshua's body to whisper in his ear. "You hang there, Joshua. Let the poison work into your system. I've always wondered if age made you more or less susceptible to wood poisoning. Either way, I hear that way to go is a bitch, but this is only a taste of what will happen to you after your hearing with the Council. I'm going to go and play now with Manny."

There was a faint stir from Joshua. His eyes widened a little more, and his speech was slurred as he tried to warn him away from the girl.

The other vampire laughed. "Maybe if you could stand up, I'd take that though seriously. Now then…" Straightening, Aspen gave Manny a sharp kick to the side that roused her fully, gasping and gagging from the air forced out of her lungs. He smiled. "Hello again, Manny. Rise and shine, princess."

Manny's vision was blurry, and became worse when Matt's father grabbed her hair and lifted her head up so she could see Joshua. Manny had known it was bad. Joshua had admitted as much. She just hadn't expected it to look so bad: the blood, the toothpicks, the broken bones…

"Joshua!"

_I'm all right, Manny. Dinnae worry yerself._ Joshua was straining in his chair, trying to rise, trying to get Aspen's attention away from Manouchka, but it wasn't working. Joshua felt himself wrapping his thoughts, thoughts of comfort and bravery, around the small shelter Manny had made around herself, preparing to protect her from the pain he could not stop. _I'm sorry, lass. They're doin' this to ye to get to me._

Because Manny was awake, she could see everything that followed perfectly. Someone knocked loudly on the door leading down to the basement, and Aspen snarled to one of the werewolves to go and answer it so that he could fiddle with opening another container of toothpicks. The were had only made it partway up the stairs when a jet of fire shot down the stairwell, causing him to fall back down to the bottom, rolling to put out the flames.

Lacey ran downstairs, sparks of flame still clutched in her hands, and armed to the teeth. She had so many knives on her that Manny burst out laughing, thinking she was looking at a medieval female Rambo. There was nothing funny when she drew one of them and slammed the hilt into the werewolf's head, knocking him unconscious.

The rest of the pack launched themselves at the female witch, who raised her flame-encrusted hands to ward them off. A female voice warned: "No! You might hit Manny and Joshua accidentally!"

With a curse, Lacey shook the flames off her hands and drew another knife to defend herself with as a horde of half-animal, half-man forms descended upon her. A small, red-headed form knocked the smallest of them aside, teeth buried around the werewolf's neck like a killer kitten. The wolf howled in pain and began grappling the girl.

_Poppy?_

_Poppy? _Joshua's mind filled with relief. _They finally made it. The cavalry._

"Sorry we're a bit late," Ash said, sauntering down. "We were planning on coming in and talking." He paused to punch a werewolf that tried to tackle him. The wolf went down and stayed down, as if hitting Ash's fist had been like hitting a brick wall. "In fact, I was going to lie through my teeth and get you to let them go, Mr. Aspen, but then your son and wife informed us that you've spent today torturing a helpless little girl and had just started on Joshua there when we decided the direct approach would be more suitable to the situation. How're you doing there, Poppy?"

The two girls were fighting back to back, and most of the pack circled them, cowering and looking for a way to break them apart to take them one on one. The red-head tossed back her thick, bouncy curls to flash blood-coated teeth. "These werewolves taste like crap. Is this why you told me that you'd let _me_ fight them?"

Ash smiled, but his gaze and cold blue eyes were directed at Aspen. "Poppy, you've had James' blood. Are you trying to tell me that my cousin tastes _better_ than a werewolf?"

"Get the hell out of my house!" Matt's father yelled.

"You know, while I'm certain that Council would appreciate your initiative, you don't have the jurisdiction to torture people for information in your basement. _I _might have been able to get away with that, but then my father was on the Council. You might have heard of him. Big, red-headed fellow with yellow eyes? Goes by the name Hunter."

"_Hunter_? Redfern? You're _Ash_?"

Ash's smiled widened. "In the flesh."

Aspen's gaze went from Ash to Joshua's inert shape in the chair, and then back. He gulped nervously and Ash began untying Joshua while the girls kept the werewolves busy.

"I know. The resemblance is uncanny, but I suppose that in the four thousand years or so between his birth and mine, eventually genetics would line themselves up again to create similar enough facial features. Now that my great-uncle is free, why don't you let go of the girl?"

His grip on Manny's hair tightened. "She's a _made_ vampire. An illegal one!"

Ash held out his hand, like Manny could just be handed over on a leash. He pouted. "I _know_. It's sad, isn't it? Kids these days. Daybreak won't give a damn about the circumstances of her initiation, but they will punish Joshua in a manner that doesn't involve breaking his bones and forcing him to watch her be tortured in front of him. Now, hand Manny and the professor over before I have to take her from you, because if I do, I assure you that I'll be taking that arm with her."

Aspen looked around at the situation. Most of the wolves were extremely injured, and he was outnumbered. He glared at Ash. "Daybreak can't get away with this."

Poppy grinned cheerfully. "It looks to me like we already have." She marched over the unconscious body of a werewolf to pick up Joshua's inert form and slung him gently over her shoulder. She was so small that his toes still dragged on the ground. "Kindly take a seat there, Mr. Aspen. Thank you. Lacey, if you'd be so kind as to tie him up so he can't follow us."

Leaving Manny to struggle to hold herself up, Mr. Aspen sat in the chair that he had just been using to hold Joshua hostage. Lacey took the length of rope that had been cut from Joshua and tied him into it so that he couldn't follow after them or attack once their backs were turned. Then the witch gently picked up Heather in her arms. She didn't seem aware of the weight at all.

"Thank you very much for your cooperation, Mr. Aspen. Now, when we leave," Ash told him, patting the man's shoulder. "We'll be taking your son with us. I don't want you to think that he's a hostage. Matthias is coming of his own free will, and if I find out that youve tried taking him out of a Daybreak sanctuary, I will hunt you down myself."

Ash turned away from him and smiled at Manny, scooping her up into his arms. She held on tightly, her body such an ache of pain that she couldn't even blush at being held so closely by the handsome, flirtatious—and currently frightening—vampire. Manny shut eyes tightly and reached for the safety that Joshua's mind had offered, but he was gone, retreated back into his own hurt and bruised shell.

Instead, she felt Ash's mind brush hers, and she relaxed her head against his shoulder. _You don't have to tell me twice. Just take me to the nearest bed and I'll sleep for a week._

* * *

"Manny!"

Hungry and still sore, Manny had awoken to find that she was sleeping in Joshua's room in the large house he shared with Heather. There was no sign of Joshua in the room, save for his smell. Deciding she was badly in need of a shower, she had made it to the bathroom before her teeth started aching so much she could no longer stand it. Manny had gone off in search of Joshua or, preferably, food.

Instead of Joshua she found Ash, Poppy, Heather and Lacey sitting around the island in the kitchen, pouring through paperwork. Once Lacey saw her roommate, she had zoomed across the room and thrown herself at Manny with enough force for both of them to tumble to the ground. Manny could hear the others laughing when she felt the cold floor on her legs and recalled she had awoken dressed only in a large t-shirt. She felt herself blush with utter humiliation.

She'd never be able to look at Ash and Poppy again.

"You've been asleep for three days now!"

"Three?"

"Yeah! Look, we even had enough time to get the sliding door fixed for Heather! Oh, god, pardon my manners. You must be hungry!"

"I am," she admitted, and lacey back off enough so that Manny could sit up on the kitchen floor. She pointedly ignored Ash and Poppy to look at Heather. "Where is Joshua, anyway? Oh God! Please, _please_ tell me he made it! Those wounds… the wood… it wasn't enough for him to _die,_ right?"

Heather smiled at her. "No, lass. Joshua just went out for some fresh air. He awoke this morning. Lacey, why don't you and Manny go into the living room? You should be comfortable in there."

"Right!" The chipper young witch helped Manny to her feet.

"What are we doing in the living room?"

"You need blood."

"Oh… yeah, that. Are you sure? This is as bad as when I woke up, Lacey. I don't think I can… control myself, and Joshua isn't around to stop me if I lose control. And you were there, in that room, and… and… and… Oh, God, Lacey!"

Manny threw her arms around her best friend and found herself being held by supportive arms as she sobbed, standing in the middle of Joshua's living room. She had been so scared in the Aspen's house, and now it was all over. Now the nightmare was _supposed _to be all over, but Manny's body still ached, she could still recall Joshua seeking solace in her mind, still remember the stench of blood, and the fear when Heather had been thrown in there with her…

"I was so terrified!" she admitted, crying.

"I know, I know. I was too, when I found out what happened to you, and every day I sat beside you, waiting for you to wake up, I started thinking about going back to his house and taking his head from his shoulders… I did go back, once… he's gone now, Matt's father. He simply took off. I guess he knew the pack and the others and I would be spreading the truth about him, about what he did. It takes a lot of cruelty to be able to hurt a girl like you, Manny, even if you were illegally turned, and I guess he couldn't stand the way anyone was looking at him anymore."

"Lacey, what's going to happen to us? To Joshua and I?" The question was a whimper.

With a small sigh, she explained, "Well, you are illegal, and there will be repercussions for that, but because Aspen's gone... Ash and Poppy are going to let you finish the term here, since it's already been paid for and everything. Next year, you're going to find a generous scholarship from another university, though, under a different name, and you're going to end up going to school somewhere else."

"Under a different name?"

"Manouchka is a wanted vampire. Living somewhere else, a big city, with a different name, you can blend in so that the Council won't find you. We're working right now to see if we can get Heather out of the contract she signed to get her to go and teach wherever you end up going, so that you'll have a friend there."

Manny's head shut up to study Lacey. "You're not going with me?"

"I can't afford the kind of move they're talking about, Manny. They're talking about U of T, or Queen's, or moving to the US and going to UCLA or something. I don't have that kind of money, and Daybreak can't afford to give scholarships to everybody… but we _will_ stay in contact and we _will_ continue to be best friends!"

"Why would Daybreak do all this for us?"

"Because they're good people who know that you were turned because you were dying. Joshua explained it all when he woke up this morning. They don't believe in punishing that kind of thing, but it does mean you're going to have to keep a low profile from the Council." She paused and then a sly grin spread over her features, crinkling her eyes. "Joshua will be going with you."

Manny's face flushed. "Joshua? What? No, you're just teasing me."

"I'm serious! He told Ash and Poppy that wherever you and Heather goes, he goes, and if he has to be separated from someone, then he'll choose to stay with you. He said some vampire needed to show you how to live in the world, and that since it was his blood that changed you, it was kind of his responsibility to take care of you. Personally, I think he _likes_ you and just couldn't stand the thought of being away from you."

"Lacey! Stop being such a tease!" She giggled, and laughed, but the truth to Lacey's words echoed home. Joshua hated being alone, and she supposed that he had picked her over Heather because she was his own kind now. It painted delicious ideas in her mind, of poetry she had studied in Heather's classes and had never understood.

She tucked those thoughts away. They concerned Joshua, not Lacey, and were best discussed with him.

"What about my family, Lacey?"

Her grin could have put a sixty watt bulb to shame. "Don't you see? If you want to be, you can be a Daybreaker now! You can _tell_ your family! And if they can't deal with it, then Joshua can block the conversation from their minds for you, and you have until the end of exam periods to say your goodbyes to them and prepare yourself for not seeing you again… and if they _can_ accept it, then you can keep in touch with them while undercover, and they can see you at Daybreak functions, and we can even see about sneaking you home for Christmas!"

"So… basically, this deal is kind of like a supernatural witness protection program?"

"Basically!"

Manny slowly began to feel herself smile, opening up to the idea. If her family couldn't accept what she was, then it was going to kind of suck… but she had Lacey by her side, and she'd keep Joshua and Heather, and make new friends like Ash and Poppy. And she could keep going with school! Now that she was a vampire and had decades, centuries, in front of her, she could take whatever she wanted now, and in a few years if it became boring, there was plenty of time to learn whole new sets of skills!

"You know, drinking blood aside, I think I could get used to being a vampire. I like these improved senses, and the telepathy thing is pretty cool. Joshua isn't nearly so scary now that I see what a big teddy bear he is under all that angst and anger." Her eyes lingered on the veins beating under Lacey's skin, and she felt her fangs descend without effort. She licked her plump lips hungrily and leaned in. Witches, she thought, were as tempting as gingerbread cookies and smelled just as yummy. "And the drinking blood thing isn't so bad with the right kind of company."


	14. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

"Mom! Dad! Manny brought home a _bunny_ for Easter!"

Joshua laughed and ran a hand nervously through his ash-blonde hair. Manny leaned up to fix his bangs for him while Heather escorted the aforementioned bunny into the household.

"Your little sister is… energetic." He pretended to be annoyed with her hands and waved them away. "I forgot what a bundle of energy she is."

Manny smiled at him. "You did _not_, you just hoped that she had changed since Christmas. Any little girl is going to be energetic when their guests for Easter dinner present a rabbit."

Joshua winced and shut the front door behind him. "I just hope that your Mom doesn't think that this is you and I bringing our own food to Easter dinner. Your Mom's a great cook, and I want to taste everything on that table that I can." The delicious scents of cinammon-roasted yams, freshly baked bread, and turkey with stuffing had escaped the kitchen to fill the entire house. He paused and looked down at her as she lead them into the living room, taking off her jacket and tossing it on the back of a nearby chair just like she had since she was a teenager. "It was also really nice of her to ask Heather and I to join the family for the holiday."

Manny shrugged. "When I told her Heather had no where else to go for Easter dinner it was practically a command. Then I mentioned that you'd be home by yourself and she started apologizing. 'Why wouldn't Joshua be invited to Easter dinner, Manouchka?' 'I don't know Mom, maybe it's because last Halloween he turned me into a vampire, remember?' 'Oh, now, Manouchka, you told me that children have a special relationship with their sires, so of _course_ he's expected to be at the dinner table!' My family is _really_ weird. Like, the Addam's Family kind of weird. Not every family could deal with their daughter turning into a vampire and still ask the man who changed her into coming over for dinner."

Despite what she said, there was a smile on her face as she looked around at her family house and heard Heather's thick accent from the kitchen as she delighted over the dishes that had been made for dinner, while introducing Manny's younger sister to the rabbit—the same one that Manny had saved from becoming her breakfast all those months ago.

Joshua shrugged out of his own jacket and placed it next to Manny's, uncertain of where else to put it. He eyed Manny—about the sixth time he had done that since he saw what she was wearing to Easter dinner. "You look really nice," he admitted when she caught him looking at her again.

Manny looked panicked and then slowly smiled. She tried to turn away, but he reached out and caught her hand, pulling her back to him. He opened his mouth to speak, but the voice of Manny's mother from the kitchen interrupted him.

"Manouchka! Joshua! Do you want some wine? We have white or red!"

Rolling her eyes, Manny hollered back, "White, please, Mom!"

"I'll have red, please!" He grinned, and Manny giggled into her free hand. Red. Like blood. The hand still held in his tingled with warmth from where his skin touched hers, and when his free hand came up to fix the collar of her shirt and adjust her necklace, she felt like her heart was squeezing. "Manny…"

"Yes?"

Joshua coughed, clearing his throat. "I just… I wanted to tell you that since we've been living together, this past year, that I've come to realize that… I care for you. Greatly. In fact, I think it's fair to say that I haven't cared this much about anyone in a great many number of centuries. I suppose I just wanted to let you know that..."

She grinned up at him teasingly. "Your accents getting thicker. And your eyes are changing color. You're nervous."

"I am not."

"Yes, you are. You can't hide it from me, Joshua. I know all your tell-tale signs of when you're lying or nervous, or happy, or angry. Right now, you're lying, you're nervous, and you're getting mad that I'm better at reading your emotions than you are mine." She held her chin up haughtily. "If you were better at reading my emotions, you would know that I've loved you since the night you saved me from Mr. Aspen. My God, Joshua! You threw yourself into the lion's den, you let yourself be tortured just to buy time until Poppy and Ash could get ready to come and get us out of there! You _knew_ what was waiting for you as soon as you handed yourself over to them, but you still came anyway. How could I not love someone as brave as that?"

His eyes flashed a shade of green that she had never seen before. They were boundless, deep and inviting. His mouth parted a little from surprise. Then he smiled and shook his head. "Aye, Manny. I knew you were trouble since I chased you down that night. Ye got under my skin, and I've not regretted it since."

"Now that we've gotten all the mushy-stuff out of the way, and don't get me wrong, because I do quite like mushy-stuff, and if you could tell me that you care for me a lot more in the future, I'd really like it, does this mean we can kiss more? I really liked that kiss we shared in your office, and I really like it when you hold me, and I wouldn't be adverse to the idea of doing that more in the future, too."

Joshua's eyes became pained, but he drew both arms around her to hold Manny tight. "Manouchka, I think that you're underestimating just how much I care for ye. You could just reach into my mind and pluck out the thoughts, ye know that, right?"

"I know, but watching you struggle like this is so much more entertaining. But does this mean no kissing, because…" He dipped his head down and silenced her with a kiss. Someone came into the living room, saw them, and wisely turned right back around and walk away, leaving Manny free to wrap her arms around his torso and hold him back with all the inhuman strength in her body, until at last he lifted his head, keeping his lips hovering over hers.

"_In that book which is memory on the first page that is the chapter when I first me you, appear the words: here begins a new life._" Manny swallowed nervously. "Dante Alighieri. That's how I feel about you."

He smiled. "Mine's a bit longer, and it's Edmund Spenser. The part that reminds me of you, though is… _My love is like to ice, and I to fire: How come it then that this her cold is so great/Is not dissolved through my so hot desire, but harder grows the more I her entreat?...Such is the power of love in gentle mind, that it can alter all the curse of kind._"

"I believe the right phrase is 'course of kind'."

"I know, but 'curse' seemed more appropriate to our particular relationship."

Manny smiled brightly. "I'm not afraid of you anymore."

"You should be."

"In fact, I think you should know I think I love you."

"You have inherited your family 'Addam's family craziness', as you so aptly phrased it a moment ago."

"But it won't stop you from kissing me more often, right?"

"I don't think it will."

"And maybe some day we can even move on to the sex? Made vampires can still have sex, right?"

Joshua sighed. "Is this how Easter is celebrated in this household?" A swift kiss from Manny stopped all arguments, so he struggled to free himself from her. "Maybe when you're older enough."

She laughed in delight and Joshua knew he had said the right thing. "No amount of me aging is ever going to stop you from being a cradle robber, Mr. I-helped-build-pyramids!"

"There were no pyramids! I already explained that!"

"No, no, don't cover your ears! Trust me, I'll just start using telepathy!"

"Is there no way to shut you up anymore? I think I liked it better when you were afraid of me and all I had to do was glare!"

"Yes, well, that's your own fault for teaching me how to project my thoughts. You could try kissing me again. That does seem to do a good job of shutting me up. Ooh, Mom! You made cheesecake for desert!"

Satisfied that the cheesecake would entertain Manny for at least a short while, Joshua found his glass of red wine and took a seat at the back of the kitchen table, watching Manny steal food behind her mother's back, the adults discuss recipes, and Manny's little sister play with the rabbit on the kitchen floor.

Family. It had been exactly what Joshua was missing for so long. He smiled and sipped at his drink.

He felt whole around her in a way he never had before. That, he believed, was the power of Spenser's 'love in gentle mind'. She had drawn him in, lured him in, with her shyness and naivety… and when that was worn away had revealed a sharp mind and a strange, perplexing sense of humor which kept him watching what he said around her. He might have tried to save Manny by changing her into a vampire, but he knew full well that in the end, she had been saved him, too.


End file.
